Louise Valliere and the Madboy
by Empirialtank
Summary: Louise Valliere wanted a familiar that would impress everyone. What she got was a crazy young man obsessed with something called science, and unfortunately for her this is no ordinary science, this is Mad Science! He might be just the help she needs to master her explosive magic, but he also might be just a little bit evil. Rated T for graphic violence and German swearing.
1. Chapter 1: Summoning Madness

Chapter 1: Summoning Madness.

It is a well known fact that in accordance with the most fundamental principles of geometry that there must exist and infinite number of alternative universes. Just as an infinite number of two dimensional squares must be arrange together to create a single three dimensional cube it follows that all alternative universes must be arranges side by side with each other in order to create a truly fifth dimensional object.

The exact reason for this is unknown. Many thousands of hours have been spent in universities across the universe trying to theorize how all these universe came to exist. The two leading theories are that either a new universe is created whenever a decision is made by anyone as history fractures itself out across the vast realms of possibility. Alternatively, it is possible that the big bang being a unstable quantum event had an infinite number of possible outcomes which led to the creation of innumerable alternative universes each with slight different starting conditions. Such as being made of anti matter or entirely of cheese or indeed a universe where magic is not only very much real but very common.

In one such magic infused universe, on a planet very much like earth, on a continent called Halkeginia, in the small country of Tristain, at its most prestigious academy of magic and education a small pink haired girl debated the possible value of lighting her room on fire. On the down side it would lead to the loss of most of her worldly possessions, but on the upside it would certainly heat up the room really quick.

It was an early day in spring though the mornings still seemed to think it was late winter and so it was rather cold. The air seemed all the more frigid to the small pink haired girl since she was buried under several layers of heavy blankets. She was mostly warm at the moment but the girl insisted on sleeping in very little at all so if she got up she would be quite cold till she managed to gather more clothes.

The knowledge that elsewhere in the academy other students was overcoming this challenge by grabbing their wands to light fires and levitate their clothes over to them only added to her irritation. Ultimately her options were none existent so she gritted her teeth, braved the cold air and dressed herself as quickly as she could. She wore a moderate length skirt with a silk white blouse beneath a long blue cloak draped over her shoulders, she covered her legs with thigh high socks and wore simple black shoes. Now that she was a bit warmer she set to the task of brushing her hair and cleaning her face. Before too long at all she was ready to face the world.

Louise Francoise Le Blanc De La Valliere, third daughter of the Valliere family, noble and mage stood before her door with her eyes closed and a haughty look on her face as she steeled herself for the coming day. Today was a special day for her, today was the day she disproved all her detractors and rivals. Today was the day she would prove once and for all that not only was she truly a mage entitled to her noble status but a damn good one. Or today was the day her unofficial runic name finally got the better of her once and for all and she would be expelled from the academy and return to her family in disgrace. The young girl visibly shrank into herself as that thought occurred to her.

But she refused to give into to such negativity. She focused her mind on the task at hand, assumed inevitable success to boost her confidence and slipped out the door. She made her way down to the main dining hall and began eating a quick breakfast. She was one of the last students to arrive for the meal, most of the other students weren't such slow starters in the morning, but this was fine with Louise. She kept her head down and made her way around the edges of the crowd trying not to be noticed. It didn't work.

Before She even reached her seat at one of the tables the snickering had started. Louise could feel her classmates stare at her and could just barely hear their whispering as she passed. Fortunately she couldn't make out exactly what they were saying and could ignore them while she ate. Inevitably though, one of them spoke up much louder than they needed to.

"So what do you all think the Zero will summon today? A Worm or a dead fish?" A nameless voice called out from somewhere in the crowd around her.

"She always pretending to be a fire mage so whatever it is will probably be burning." Another voice answered.

"Oh, I hope so," One of the slightly larger of her classmates added, "I would love to have some broiled fish this afternoon."

"Knowing her it will just be another explosion." A female voice dismissed.

"I hope not, I would hate for my new familiar to get hurt by her incompetence, maybe we will all get lucky and nothing will happen at all, and she can finally just leave the school." One last voice stated and all around the room there were murmurs of agreement as the school collectively wished for its least talented mage to leave.

Louise bore it all silently without even looking up. After a whole year of this she had a lot of experience at ignoring them all. At least that girl was keeping quiet. Then Louise realized she had spoken too soon as the very girl in question got up and walked over the group that had done most the name calling.

Kirche Augusta Frederica Von Anhalt Zerbst daughter of the Zerbst family of Germania, known as The Ardent for her passionate fire Magic was a sight to behold. Her bronze skin accented her fiery red hair and lips. She wore the same uniform as Louise though hers was visibly straining itself to contain her full womanly body. She couldn't, or wouldn't in Louise's mind, even get the top button of her shirt closed leaving no small amount of cleavage shown to the world. She moved with a proud grace and sensually rocked her hips back and forth just enough to be noticeable without seeming like she was trying.

"Don't you all think you're not giving our Louise enough credit?" She asked the group of students in her most innocent voice as if she was actually defending her classmate. Louise ground her teeth and gripped at the fork in her hand bracing herself for what was to come.

"No mere worm or explosion will be quite enough for Louise the Zero," Kirche continued half glancing at Louise out of the corner of her eye. "A bull or cow will be much more suited to her. Slow, dull and almost useless just like how she is."

"Oh you be quiet Zerbst!" Louise shouted rising up. "If I'm going to summon a cow then you're going to summon a half dead dog in heat!"

"Hmmm." Kirche said to herself with her hand on her chin and a contemplative look on her face, as if she was seriously considering the prospect. "Yes I think a wolf or a hound would suite me just fine. A master of the pack Zerbst to herd you Valliere cattle about, oh how perfect that would be. Don't you think so Louise?"

"Don't call me that, Zerbst!" Louise yelled back.

"Oh why not sweet Louise aren't we friends? Shouldn't we be on a first name basis by now?" Kirche reasonably asked.

"We are not friends! Just you all wait and see! My familiar will put you all to shame! Legends will be written about it! People will come from miles just to see it!" Louise declared.

"Yeah I bet a lot of people would travel pretty far to see that big of a hole in the ground!" A voice called out from behind her and the room exploded in laughter. Louise blushed furiously, which even Kirche giggled at the sight of. And with that Louise left the room doing her best to hold in her tears.

* * *

The rest of the morning preceded without much incident. Louise truly enjoyed her classes and not just because within the classrooms the teachers didn't tolerate distractions of any kind and as such Louise's various detractors had to keep quiet. The pink haired girl had a natural thirst for knowledge and she was a skilled student. Even Kirche had to admit that her notes were the most detailed in the class and that her ability to strain the most useful knowledge out of the all to often self aggrandizing lectures of her teachers was second to none. And best of all after a year of less than stellar results her teachers had stopped making her try to actually do any spells.

Not that her classes were actually interesting today. This was still the first day back to school after the end of year break so the teachers were taking the time to review most everything the student had learned in the past year. This wasn't helped by the fact that the Earth magic professor hadn't reached the academy yet so they got two whole classes of professor Kaita the Blowhard. Finally as the day was drawing to a close they went to professor Colbert who after a brief review of fire magic and a review of the Summon Servant spell, took the student outside to a nearby hill to begin the ritual.

The Spring time Summoning Ceremony was one of the most holy and sacred days of any mage's life. Conducted in the second year of a mage's formal education it marked the transition from a mere student to an official dot class mage. The spell was ancient beyond all knowledge and didn't belong to any of the four common classes of magic. Some people thought it was a void magic spell but the jury was out on the subject. Really no one really knew why the spell worked or how only that it did.

As the professor called from volunteers to go first, Louise slipped into the back of the crowd. All around her all the student were idly chatting away about what they thought they would summon to become their familiar. It was an important event for everyone. A mage's familiar was a reflection of their power and the nature of their elemental affinity. According to the lore of the spell, it would summon the perfect familiar for a mage. One that would protect and serve them their whole life.

Kirche naturally insisted on going first. Louise couldn't quite make out what she said for her spell but it formed easily enough. In a flash a green oval shaped portal opened in the air before her. After just a moment or two a red lizard, the size of a hunting dog with a flaming tail stalked out of the portal. Its eyes swept over the crowd before it walked over to Kirche's side and sat before her patiently as the germainian kissed its forehead, marking the creature with a few ruins and binding it to her will forever.

Louise recognized the creature as a Salamander one of the strongest creatures a fire mage could summon. She burned with jealousy at the thought of Kirche's having such a thing. Really Louise would have to summon a unicorn or a manticore to match such an accomplishment and she was just hoping to summon anything at this point and finally break the stigma of being a zero. While she was focusing on the Zerbst's success the second student had just completed the ritual.

Louise's attention was drawn back to the summoning ground as the crowd around her oohed and awed at the next familiar. Louise's mouth fell open at the sight of a wind dragon standing before the crowd. Louise was left dumbfounded at the thought of what one of her classmates had managed, but then understood as she saw the dragon bowing to none other than Tabitha the strongest mage in their class. Rumor had it that now that she had summoned a familiar she would be recognized as a triangle class mage, as strong as some of the professors at the school.

Louise sighed in resignation, she knew Tabitha was going to summon something awe inspiring but this was too much. There was no way she was ever going to match an actual dragon being summoned. Founder Brimir alone only knew when such a thing had last happened at the academy. Now more than a little depressed, the small girl slunk back into the midst of the crowd and tried not to think about the rest of the ceremony.

One by one each of her fellow students went up and preformed their summoning spell. All of them were successful, though none matched Kirche's or Tabitha's familiars. Most of the students summoned house pets like cats or dogs, small reptiles and the odd bird. One student managed to summon what looked like a floating eye ball, which the others recognized as a bug bear. All and over it was a rather normal session.

Eventually Professor Colber called out to see if there were any students left who hadn't cast the spell yet. Louise wasn't paying attention though so for a moment it seemed like everyone was finished. Then Kirche spoke up.

"Hold on Professor Louise the Zero hasn't gone yet."

"Ah." The professor noted as he turned to look at Louise who was glaring at Kirche like normal. "Thank you Ms. Zerbst I had almost forgotten. Well Ms. Valliere would be so kind as to wrap this up for us all?"

Louise gulped to herself and made her way over to the clearing where all the spells had been cast. She walked with a great deal of prideful dignity as her classmates once more began to taunt her with predictions of failure. Louise ignored them, then raised her wand and began to cast her spell.

"To my beautiful, divine, and powerful Familiar that dwells somewhere in this universe heed my call..." She started as her fellow students wondered at such a strange incantation, but she continued ignoring them and speaking the words that came naturally to her. "To the Pentagon of the five elemental powers my name is Louise Francoise Le Blanc De La Valliere, heed my call and summon forth my familiar."

At her order a green portal opened up before her, just like it had for all the other students. Louise was delighted, no explosion, no fizzle she had cast the spell and it had done what she wanted it to on the first time. Now she just had to wait for her familiar to appear. For a rather long moment the portal just stood there then it exploded. Or rather, then a massive explosion flew out of it along with a ten foot long column of fire and smoke that swept past Louise missing her by a few inches. Behind her something crashed into a tree and then the smoke dissipated and the portal was gone.

"_Scheisse_!" Someone behind her exclaimed. Louise turned to look at the tree that the explosion had struck. She and the rest of her classmates looked on as a young man who rose up from the smoke.

"_Hy svere hyu brain von or two of dat Scheisskerl's idiot sons to death_" The boy at the tree declared as he brushed himself off, "_und suddenly he sets the self distruck divice goink und legs it! Who even does sometink loike dat heyes tells ya_."

The boy looked to be about sixteen or seventeen years old. He had black hair and blue eyes a heavy pair of goggles were strapped to his head and his face was covered in soot and grease. He wore a light blue shirt beneath a heavy leather vest along with a thick pair of long pants strapped down by a large belt around his waist with two pouches on the sides and a pair of thick heavy boots on his feet. His clothes were ratty and torn in several places, burned and black in others. His boots were covered in mud and his arms in grease. In his right hand he held very large metal wrench almost three and a half feet in length. It looked like one end was covered in some kind of thick black oil while the other had a red liquid dripping from it that looked a rather lot like blood to Louise. He was speaking with what sounded like a thick germainian accent, but Louise spoke that barbaric tongue and knew that this man wasn't speaking anything like it. A thought occurred to Louise but she shuddered at it and hoped it wasn't true.

"That man's a commoner!" One of her classmates cried out echoing Louise fears. It certainly looked true. He wasn't wearing the signature cape of a mage, and he wasn't carrying a wand. The handful of tools on his belt marked him as a craftsman which probably made him better than the common peasant, but this boy clearly had no magic at his disposal.

"Trust in the Zero to always mess up in new and inventive ways!"

"A commoner seems perfect for you Zero!"

"I suppose we should be glad that he was the only one who got hit by her explosion!" The various students around her called out and began to laugh at her. Louise turned red with embarrassment which soon gave way to despair, she had been so close! She had opened the portal! It hadn't exploded for a full thirty seconds! She turned to her professor who was looking at the boy quite intently.

"Professor!" She exclaimed "There must have been some mistake, I can't have a commoner for a familiar! Let me try the spell again I know I can do it right this time."

Professor Colbert looked over her and then back at the boy in question. He was glaring angrily at the surrounding students muttering to himself. The professor ran a quick detect magic spell on the boy and sure enough he couldn't sense even a single iota of magic power from the child. It seemed he really was a commoner. But that was blood on his wrench, and there had been an explosion coming from the portal when he emerged. Something was very off about this whole situation. Nonetheless the ritual's rules were clear.

"I'm sorry Ms. Valliere" The professor explained. "But the boy is what came out of the summoning spell and therefore he is your familiar. Even if you wanted to the spell can't be recast. Now please complete the ritual so we can all go back."

Louise audibly sighed as her classmates laughed again. But her back remained ram rod straight and she approached the boy who was going to be her familiar weather she wanted it or not. As she did the boy stared at her awkwardly but he wasn't glaring at her as he had at the others. He even looked a bit sympathetic, he must have grasped that most of the laughing was aimed at her not at him. Louise wasn't certain how she felt about that, the fact that a commoner felt sorry for her was infuriating, the fact that anyone felt sympathy for her was a godsend.

"_Und now von of hyu just valks up to me loike its nothink_." The boy rambled to himself looking a bit annoyed. "_Zo Toots any chance hyu vant to tell me vat happened to me or is hyu just gonna keep on sayink dat nonsense language of hyors?_"

This close Louise got a better look at him. Her attention was naturally drawn to his eyes, they were a rather deep blue and very expressive. They reminded her of a hawk's eyes, ferocious but also very focused and very intelligent. This whole language thing was going to be a problem and Zerbst was never going to let her live this whole business down. But other than that, she was quickly warming up to the idea of this boy serving her. If he was a craftsmen he would be very useful around the house, and he may even be skilled at basic accounting. She tried not to think of him as a commoner but as a magically summoned butler, which at least was a little exciting. His face was filthy though, she regretted not bringing a handkerchief with her.

She grabbed the man's head in her hands and pulled him down towards her. He looked surprised at what was happening but made no attempt to stop it. She focused on his eyes and he matched her gaze with a curious intensity.

"You better be grateful for this commoner, most people would go there whole lives without this ever happening to them." She said and then cast the last part of the spell. "Pentagon of the five elemental powers, grant your blessing up on this creature and bind it as my familiar."

And with that, she drew towards him and kissed the strange man on his lips. The man was shocked at first but soon answered in kind and pressed back against her, which Louise hadn't been expecting that so she pulled back quickly. The boy had a altogether lewd look on his face as he grinned mischievously at her.

"_Vera nize sveethot. Hy had best be careful now, mine poppa alvays varned me about goils loike hyu_." As her new familiar spoke he face started to cringe and he looked down at his left hand. "_Oy, vat did hyu do vit mine hand_?"

"Don't worry," She reassured the obviously disturbed boy as the runes of a familiar appeared on his hand, "It will be over soon."

Sure enough the burning the boy was feeling passed quickly enough. When it had he looked at her suspiciously but didn't say anything. Professor Colbert recaptured everyone attention as he cleared his throat.

"And with that we are all finished." He stated matter of factly. "Well now, let's all head back to the academy. This will conclude all of class for the day, and I remind you all that there will be no classes tomorrow, please use this time to get to know your familiars more closely."

When he had finished the class began to collectively chant a spell together and before long every student was lifted off the ground and into the air as they gently floated away. Only Louise who couldn't cast that spell remained on the ground with her familiar, professor Colbert levitated up but remained close to Louise to ensure no harm came to her, and also to get a better look at the boy's ruins which seemed rather strange. Tabitha also didn't bother cast the spell, she simply flew away on the back of her dragon. Louise's familiar watched in interest as the class flew off whistling in amazement.

"_Say dots a preety goot trick hyu guys got here. Hyu is goink to have to show me how to do dat some time_." He said is his strange tongue. Louise just sighed and motioned for him to follow her as she walked back to the dorms. At least no one had made fun of fact she couldn't fly, and at least her familiar had to sense to follow her. It was going to be a very long night.

* * *

It had been a very long night by the time Louise got back to her room. Her familiar had been kind enough to follow her, but he had yet to shut up. She had expected the sight of the academy to at least have left him in silent awe, but the man had never stopped rambling to himself in that weird nonsense language of his. Worse still Louise guessed from his tone he was being rather critical of the place.

"_Hyu call dis granite_?" He said examining the stone work of the walls."_Hy dont dis here iz common composite stones if ever hy saw dem. Probably dug up from some farmer's field. Vouldn't take more den an hour or two to break true dis stuff. Und vats vith all dese candles everywhere? have hyu pipple ever heard of torches? Cuz da tallow industry is cleaning hyu all out_."

Finally they reached her room and its privacy. Here at least Louise was willing to try something desperate to shut her familiar up. She would try magic. With a deft flick of her wrist she brought her wand out and pointed it at her familiar.

"Silence!" She ordered and cast her spell which should have kept her from hearing her familiars words. Instead there was a loud bang, a shock wave that staggered her backwards and a cloud of smoke appeared between them.

"Oh come on, was that really necessary?" She heard from the smoke.

"Hey I understood that!" She exclaimed. As the smoke cleared her familiar appeared before her and answered back.

"Ah so you people do speak Dutch, about time you answered up instead of continuing on in that babble you were making earlier." The boy declared. He still had something of a germainian accent to his speech but it wasn't as pronounced and now his words sounded like crisp clean trade speak to her ears.

"I'm not speaking 'duch' or whatever you called it. I'm speaking the common speech and now you are as well thanks to my translation spell." Louise explained, leaving out the fact that she had just been trying to get him to shut up. The boy snorted at the thought.

"So you're saying that magic is letting us understand each other? Yeah right, try pulling the other one it goes zing." He said, and Louise glared at him.

"What's that supposed to mean? I cast a spell on you and its letting us understand each other. That's what happened." Louise insisted not about to let go of the fact that one of her spells had done something useful.

"Well this magic stuff is doing an impressive amount of work for something that isn't real." Her familiar declared dismissively before arrogantly barreling onward. "Now stop playing these games little girl. What's up with this elaborate ruse you all are pulling? Where in _gottes namen_ are we? and who are you anyway?"

Louise glared at this presumptuous commoner. Who was he to talk this way to her? Didn't he see her cape? Didn't he realize he was talking to a noble? And how dare he dismiss something as sacred and vital as magic!

"I am Louise Francoise Le Blanc De La Valliere noble daughter of house of Valliere a mage and your master!" She declared readying up for a full noble rant against this commoner.

"_Du hast den arsch offen_!" The boy cried out interrupting her. Normally she would've rolled over him and continued her rant but this was the second time her translation spell had left a few words unchanged. She wondered if these words had no equivalent in the trade speak or if given the nature of how vehemently he spoke them, her magic was trying to spare her lady like sensibilities.

"No way on earth is anyone my master!" The boy declared, "Especially not some pink haired little _Schlampe_ of a girl like you!"

"I am your master!" Louise declared, recovering from her earlier stupor. "My spell summoned you here and that make you my familiar and servant! That's what those ruins on the back of your hand means! We are now magically bound together for the rest of time!"

Then the boy laughed at her. Her familiar was laughing in her face at the very thought of serving her. Louise discovered for the first time in her life what is was like to be livid. But before she could lay into him, the boy turned to leave.

"Yeah," He said still laughing to himself. "Well you and your magic can keep dreaming. I'm leaving..."

But then he stopped as his eyes drifted passed the window. He stared very intently at the window for a moment or two and rushed towards it, threw it open and stuck his head outside into the early evening air. When he pulled his head back in there was a wild look in his eyes like he couldn't believed what he saw.

"Why are there two moon!?" He demanded to know, but before Louise could even think to answer he had rushed back to the window and was peering out again. He returned a moment later and added, "And why is one of them pink!?"

"What do you mean why are there two moons there have always been two moons." Louise explained dismissively.

"There most certainly haven't been two moons. I admit I may not have kept tabs on things up there every single day, but I distinctly remember that the last time I checked there was only one moon. And it wasn't pink!"

"Well obviously you are the most oblivious person in the world because there has always been two moons, and yes even a pink one! Why would I lie about that and you can see them right there."

The boy seemed to pause as he considered this. He looked back at the window and started mumbling to himself. "How the hell do you even get a pink color? The actual moon is silver because its mostly made of dust and stone and lacks the high carbon content that gives our soil its darker color. It would have to be a pink stone. But there's no such thing as pink stone! It would have to made out of rubies or rhodochrosite, but there's no way the surface would like that if it was. It must have been part of much larger older moon to exert the pressure to arrrrrrr..."

Her familiar finished his ramblings with a strange growling noise as he grasped the sides of his head and pulled at his hair. He glared at the window as if willing the sky to change. Eventually he exhaled with a heavy sigh as it seemed a realization dawned on him. He turned back to face the pink haired girl.

"It occurs to me," He began in a much more even and polite tone. "That I may have been a bit rude earlier and I interrupted you while you were answering my questions. I'm sorry. Where exactly are we again?"

Louise looked at him as one would look at a singing rock. She studied him a moment before seating herself at a nearby table and began to heat up some tea for herself. She continued to study him for a moment or two more while he remained unusually quiet and controlled. Finally she answered him.

"We are in the Tristain Academy of Magic. The dormitories to be exact. My dorm room to be absolutely precise."

"Magic academy right..." The boy said rocking back and forth like he working himself up to ask some rather stupid questions. "And that would be in the kingdom of...?"

"Tristain." Louise supplied.

"Of course, of course. I don't suppose this would be on the continent of like the Americas or Africa or the mysterious fair east?"

"The continent is called Halkeginia. How do you not know any of this? Have literally not paid attention to a single thing going on around you your whole life?"

"No, I've never paid attention to this world. Because this clearly isn't my world. My world only had one moon, and it was a quite sensible color too! My continent was called Europa and my homeland was in... actually I'm not too sure about that. Probably Austria, we were normally part of Austria but it's a bit politically nebulous. Anyway I've never heard of a continent called Halkeginia or a land called Tristain or a world with a pink moon before so this spell of yours has summoned me to a different _ficken_ universe!"

Louise looked perplexed at this. The Summon Servant spell normally only summoned creatures that could be found from throughout Halkeginia. She had never heard of it grabbing something from another world. But he did seem genuinely surprised by the whole moon thing so maybe he was telling the truth. Or he was really stupid.

"Regardless you are here now. If you serve me I will make sure you are provided for with food and clothing. Really for a commoner like yourself it should be an honor to serve a noble of my status."

"I don't suppose there is a reverse summoning spell you could use to just send me back to where I came from and we can both forget about this whole thing."

"No I've never heard of such a spell. I don't know why anyone would make one. Most familiars are all too happy to obey their masters and make themselves useful."

"Girl no matter how much you say, no matter how much magic you cast, no matter how many ruins you write on my hands, I am not your slave."

"A familiar is not a slave!" Louise insisted, "It is an ancient and sacred relationship between a mage and a noble creature of mutual reliance!"

"Doing whatever I'm told expecting no more compensation than basic living necessities, yeah when you do that to a human it's called slavery. Either way I'm not interested in it! Although, it seems I am in need of a job."

"I see no reason why I should have to pay for my familiar to serve me. I would be the laughing stock of the school!"

"And I see no reason to not just walk out of here and take my chances in the woods."

"You wouldn't last five minutes out there." Louise mocked the supposed craftsmen.

"Do not underestimate me child. There is nothing I cannot do. And there is no way for you to stop me if I should. Why should I possibly consider staying with you?"

"And what would you do otherwise? Those ruins mark you as a familiar, no one would hire you and risk earning a noble's wrath. Subsisting in the woods like a common outlaw is all you could do if you could even do that."

The boy visibly scoffed at this idea. Either he didn't believe her or he wasn't opposed to the idea of living as an outlaw. This was getting out of hand. She couldn't summon another familiar and like it or not but this boy was the only thing that proved she was really a mage. She couldn't really afford to let him go out and get himself killed in the forest while stupidly trying to protect his pride. She had to convince him.

"Look," She said, "If you stay here you won't need anything, and so long as you are here I promise you I will look into a way to send you back to wherever it was you came from. While you're here you can learn about this new world you're going to have to live in. And it's not like it is going to be hard work or anything. Just a few daily chores to keep up appearances. Is this really so bad?"

The boy paused thinking over these ideas. Room and board were nothing to scoff at and he had to admit that he could use some time to feel out the lay of the land, gather some supplies and learn exactly what he had just fallen into. But this whole familiar business didn't sit well with him. He simply didn't see a reason why he should serve this girl.

Even after a single conversation with her he could already guess that this girl took herself way to seriously, she was prideful and way to entitled. He didn't doubt for a moment that this girl was a noble, raised with proverbial silver spoon in her mouth. But on the other hand. She was a girl everyone laughed at, she was the only student who couldn't fly, and it seemed that something had gone quite wrong with this whole summon servant spell. It didn't take a genius to paint the picture here, to see how her life may have been much harder than he guessed. So was she trying to secure his services out of entitlement or desperation?

On the third hand she was a noble. No matter how small; she had at least some political clout in this strange land that he knew nothing about. Worse still he had the sneaking suspicions that his particular skill set might not be so highly valued here, or even heard of. This land of magic, and classism, he hated it already, and he was probably stuck here for the rest of his life. He would need to change things and this girl could help him. There was potential here. But how much? The perennial screw up might be the only one willing to listen to him, but could she actually do anything? He didn't know. He needed more time to consider this.

"So to conclude," He finally said after a long period of silence. "You want me to be your familiar, which means serving you and helping like a good little pet. But I have no intention of being anyone's slave. You don't want to pay me, but you also don't want me to leave and staying here could be useful for me. We seemed to have reached an impasse."

Louise sighed in frustration, this was getting her nowhere. "I bet no other mage in the history of the world has had to negotiate with their familiar like this."

"I imagine most other mages have the good sense to summon an animal that is only interested in subsistence. But you summoned a human and humans work for a purpose. If we had a mutually beneficial goal to work towards I might be persuaded to enter into a partnership with you. But I don't consider your ease and comfort to be a purpose worth throwing my life at. And that seems to be all you're interested in."

"For now all I want is to learn magic and graduate here a successful and respected mage, comfort is secondary to be honest. Normally a familiar is an assistant to a mage, gathering ingredients for spells and defending a mage's life while they cast spells. But I can hardly ask you to risk your life for me and I imagine you don't know much enough about magic to collect anything useful for me so that just leaves household chores. Well what would be a purpose you would be willing to throw your life at?"

"I don't know. As you said I don't know anything about this world so I don't honestly know if there is anything worth doing here."

"Well why don't you work for me until you do find something worth doing and then we will consider a partnership together." Louise said bringing this part of the conversation full circle.

"Perhaps..." The boy admitted. "But there will be conditions for this. But perhaps we should table this discussion for the morning."

Louise agreed with that. This was getting more and more frustrating for her. She was a mage, he was a commoner so naturally he should obey her. And he was her familiar so obedience should come second nature to him, but he was being so stubborn and unreasonable. She was really getting tempted to just start beating him like a disobedient house pet. But she didn't, that would be unbecoming of a lady. Plus while she was a mage, she didn't know much about fighting and this man was obviously confident in his strength. Some time to get her thoughts in order would be good. With any luck the man would simply accept his role soon enough.

"It has been a long day," She admitted finishing off the tea she had made earlier. "A night's rest could do us both some good."

She paused for a moment before looking to the corner of the room were a pile of hay was amassed. "I was just expecting an animal for a familiar so I can't offer much for bedding..."

"I think I will search out my own arrangements for the night thank you." He dismissed as he turned to the door and made to leave. Louise turned away as well and began to undress for the night.

"You will still be here tomorrow, right?" She asked.

"Yes I will still be here." He promised, a small amount of annoyance creeping into his voice. Louise nodded, before throwing her shirt and skirt into a nearby basket.

"While you're out, you can take care of the laundry." She added, the boy looked back at her as she climbed into bed. "It's not like you have anything else to do."

"I'm going to pretend that you asked me to do this in a much more polite manner." He said picking up the basket. "And I'm also going to pretend that your thanking me as I leave."

"Oh and before I forget." Louise called out just as he was closing the door. "What was your name again?"

"You can call me Saito." Her familiar answered as he left.

'What a strange name,' Louise thought to herself before rolling over and going to sleep.

* * *

In the hallways of the Tristain Academy of Magic work never really stopped even this late at night. Although magic was powerful enough that most mages could live self sufficiently if they wished, nobles saw it as their duty to keep the down trodden and oppressed employed. Usually as their servants or guards so long as they could be trusted not to steal anything. Thus the academy employed quite a large number of non magic users. One such house keeper was a young woman named Siesta who worked at the academy to help support her rather large family back home.

Her work at the academy was constant and tireless. There was always something that needed to be done, but since she was supposed to keep out of the nobles way and sight there was no efficient way to do it all. The nobles had to be fed and served constantly. The whole place always needed cleaning and dusting. Clothing had to be washed, floors swept, windows cleaning, and metal work needed polishing. Most of this the staff could only do when the nobles were away at classes or asleep like now. So Siesta toiled away dusting old pieces of artwork and trying to finish this last room as quickly as possible.

While the work was constant, it wasn't particularly hard, and most of it Siesta had learned to do back at her old farm. Really her biggest problem was that the lack of mental engagement left her free to daydream which in turn made her easily distracted. So Siesta dusted away while imagining what it would be like to be carried off by a noble prince and live as a pampered princess the rest of her life. It was one of her favorite day dreams no matter how ridiculous and impossible she knew it to be.

And so distracted as she was, Siesta first warning that someone was coming to the room she was in was when she accidentally began dusting their face. Siesta immediately jumped back and quickly yelled an apology while vigorously bowing to the person, certain she was about to get fired, while they tried to calm her down. Finally Siesta caught sight of something that took her completely by surprise. The man she had just dusted had a set of ruins on his left hand.

"Wait a minute." She suddenly declared midway through her fifth apology, "You're that new human familiar aren't you?"

"So the rumors are already spreading?" Saito asked, glad the woman had stopped making a fool of herself. "Nothing too bad I hope."

"Oh no, nothing about you really just that Ms. Valliere had forced some poor soul to pretend to have been summoned by her."

"Ms. Valliere has forced me to do nothing." Saito insisted, a bit to forcefully in Siesta's opinion. "Her spell brought me here and marked me with these ruins. We're still negotiating that whole familiar business."

"Oh No!" Siesta exclaimed, "Don't tell me you have been arguing with the young mistress have you? You mustn't do that Mr. Familiar. Nothing good comes from getting a noble angry. Best to just keep your head down."

Saito rolled his eyes at this statement. He had kind of hoped that commoners around here would have a bit more back bone to them than this. Still judging from the uniform this girl was a maid here so perhaps she simply had a naturally submissive personality.

"I'll keep that in mind." He answered and then indicated to the large basket of laundry he had thrown over his right shoulder. "Would you mind telling me where I might find a wash room? The young mistress asked me to do her laundry."

"Oh yes, right this way." The maid explained and led the way. "Um, you know I could do that for you if you wanted, I'm sure you have better things to do this evening."

"Not really." Saito answered. "Besides I could use a chance to do a little work."

Shortly Siesta led him to a moderate sized room deep in the bowls of the academy. There was an open well in the middle of the room with several wash boards in the water and number of long thick ropes set across the back walls. Saito looked over the room and realized that doing the laundry would be a bit more work than he had figured.

"And here I was hoping that magic might have managed some way of quickly cleaning everything." Saito lamented.

"That would require a mage to be down in this room pretty much constantly. And one could hardly expect them to do that." Siesta explained. "Don't worry it won't take too long, why don't we just split the basket between us?"

Saito agreed and the two set to work immediately. At first Saito only watched as Siesta cleaned a few pieces of clothing, then he joined right in on the other end. Siesta wasn't surprised he had watched her do the first few, most men never had to clean anything, either their mothers did it or their wives did. Siesta honestly wouldn't have been surprised if she ended up doing a majority of the work tonight, but she was wrong about that.

Although it was clear that Saito had never done laundry before, since he took a rather long time to get through the first few pieces, constantly finding new spots or stains he had missed, he learned quickly. He was constantly improving, getting through each one faster and faster. Soon he matched her pace, even doing the shirts faster than she did.

It wasn't that he rushed the work, he was simply very, very efficient. He never washed anything too much. Nor did he leave anything undone. He had figured out exactly how much work it would take to clean any stain and did exactly enough to get it clean. He paused for some time when he pulled out the first piece of Louise's panties to clean. But only because he seemed fascinated by the elastic band, he took great care not to stress the band to much as he washed it.

However, the longer it all seemed to go on the more agitated the young man seemed to become. He glared at the clothing and at the wash board. He seemed to be mumbling under his breath, and occasionally staring off into space like he was doing sums in his head. He started fidgeting and almost shaking. It was as if he was filled to the brim with excess energy. He also seemed very frustrated with something.

Yet the quality of his work never fell. He still worked very quickly and did a very good job. If Siesta had to say something she would've said that he had mastered the craft of doing laundry by hand. She wanted to complement him, to reassure him that there wasn't anything wrong with his work. To put her hand on his shoulder and get him to calm down for just a moment. But she couldn't bring herself to. She didn't know why, but there was something about him which seemed like it would snap if she reminded him she existed.

Finally he finished and jumped back from the laundry. His hands grabbed his hair pulling it up and backwards as he paced back and forth. He had a wild look in his eyes that were constantly looking back and forth over the wash room. Gradually his voice elevated, but he was talking way to quickly for her to understand, mostly he seemed to be complaining about all the things he didn't have. Though Siesta could only guess at what half of those things were. Finally she found the courage to speak to him.

"I thought you did rather well for your first time." She encouraged him.

"Not good enough," He declared, "To limited with single set of hand, no faster than two point three four pairs of pants a minute. Not fast enough, not nearly fast enough. Soap contaminates the well water wasting it in the event of a siege. Need to pump it out into separate containers, use rotary motion to mix the soap into the fabric, secondary faster spin cycle to remove water generate fiction to dry clothes. Whole load forty five minutes. Still not fast enough, maybe high level light focused to generate heat vaporize stains. Whole load twenty five minutes. But I don't have the steel, I don't have the power source, I don't have the tools!"

Siesta still had no idea what the man was ranting about, but she did grasp that last part. She could see from his clothes that he was used to wearing a number of different tools on his person. Most likely he was an apprentice craftsmen, or even a journeymen. Siesta knew that in most fields craftsmen were responsible for making their only tools as proof they were skilled enough to take over the more detailed work of their masters. An apprentice couldn't even become a journeyman till they had made a whole set for themselves which often took years as they delicately carved each individual tool out of hard iron or brass. To have lost his whole set when he was summoned here would've been years of wasted effort.

With tears almost swelling in her eyes Siesta started to grasp exactly what it was this young man had lost when he was summoned her. His tools were gone. His past was gone. His job was gone. His family was gone and he would probably never see any of them again. All because some magic spell had ripped him out of his home and dropped him in the middle of serving some noble he had probably never heard of.

"I'm sorry." She offered trying anything to comfort him. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"I suppose." Saito said skeptically as if he couldn't believe she actually wanted to help him. "Well I can't really do anything without tools, I don't suppose there a workshop or a smithy around here I could work at?"

"Well we don't have anything really professional around here but... The Farrier does have a small furnace and anvil you might be able to use."

"That would work well enough I think." Saito said and indicated her to lead the way.

She led them out of the main dorm rooms over to a small shack by the academy stables. There was light coming from the shack's door and within Saito could hear the tell tale sound of banging metal. Inside they met a rather large heavy set man whom Siesta introduced as Mr. Charles. She quickly explained the situation to Charles who looked over Saito approvingly.

"So you're a tradesmen eh boy? Can't be a good one if you forgot your tools behind just because of some little magic." Charles said jokingly. "I suppose I could help out, but you will owe me for every tool of mine you have to use."

"Fine with me." Saito agreed, "It's a better deal than what my father offered me. I'll need the forge, the anvil and a hammer. What about iron?"

"The nobles give me the scraps and leftovers from when the practice their alchemy. I've got plenty of iron, don't worry about it."

Saito smiled and set to work. He grabbed one of the heavy forge hammers and a few large blocks of wood, with a few quick smacks he knocked the boards apart into a set of large heavy planks. He reached into one of the large pouches at his side and removed a few heavy pieces of paper and fashioned together a set of large bellows. He affixed one to the front of the forge, and dropped in several chunks of scrap iron. After working the bellows for several minutes he heated the iron till it glowed orange in the low light.

With a smack of his hammer he launched the block of glowing metal out of the forge and onto the anvil. He began to beat on it and soon split the block in half. He knocked one block back into the forge, and split about a quarter off of the second piece. He beat the smaller piece into a set of nails, and used a bar of scrap metal to fashion an impromptu handle and soon assembled his own hammer. He dropped his creation into a bucket of water and cooled it off as he handed the Farrier back his hammer.

Charles could only stare at with wonder at the young man. He had never seen someone break iron apart just by hitting it. He also never seen anyone beat metal into such perfect shape in just a few swings. The old craftsmen suddenly realized he was standing in the presence of a true master of the forge. In near slack jawed awe he spoke.

"Thanks," He said as he took the hammer from the young man as he picked up his new solid metal hammer and began wrapping the handle in a length of rope. "Need any help with anything?"

"Yeah if you could man the bellows for me? Keep a steady pace if you can. Yes just like that." Saito explained as the older man took up the role of an eager apprentice. Once again Saito knocked a glowing block of metal out on to the anvil and set to work. After just a few minutes he hand beat out a pair of tongs from the scrap.

Next he began beating the metal out into long thin metal plates. Several of which he bound together into a serious of pipes. But most he used it to make iron into a set of large metal pots which he lined with heavy clay. One of which he set besides the forge with another pipe leading to it constantly blasting scalding hot air at it. The other he set on a pair of wooden stilts so that it could be tilted back and forth, and placed it just outside the shed tilted slightly on its side. At the base of the second one he set up another large bellow piping air into the base of the strange device.

Siesta was amazed by how quickly the young man worked. It hadn't been more than an hour at most and he had already radically rebuilt the forge to serve some yet unseen purpose. Once more it wasn't that the man rushed his work or anything he was just inhumanly efficient. She noticed that his hammer didn't bounce when he struck metal. His hammer came down and the metal bent under his blow in a shower of sparks.

He was quick, and rather graceful as he moved about the forge with practiced ease. He was always just where he needed to be. Always one step ahead of the melting iron, always in just the right place to carry it all on to the next step in the process. He had removed his shirt and jacket in favor of a heavy leather apron to shield his chest from the heat while leaving his skin free to breath and sweat.

In the soft orange light of the forge, Siesta studied the young man's exposed back with interest. He was by no means muscular, lacking the shier size of a man like Mr. Charles. But he was very... taunt. His muscles looked like wires drawn across his back and arms, not bulging but visibly straining to contain the strength within them. It was clear the Saito was stronger than he looked, and it was a strength focused on agile precision.

Saito paused for a brief moment to look over his work. He smiled to himself and rubbed his hands together in anticipation. He set Siesta working the second set of bellows beneath his second strange device, and began piling scrap metal into bowl he had built besides the forge. When it was full of iron he opened a valve on a pipe coming out of the forge and began to blast the contents of the bowl with hot air from the forge. He ordered Charles to increase his pace and poured more charcoal into the forge while complaining about what he wouldn't give for some decent coke. Soon the iron glowed red hot, then orange hot, and soon white hot as it began to melt. He splashed water on the bottom of the bowl to quickly cool it, and as a great cloud of hot steam filled the shed he grabbed bowl with a pair of tongs lifted it and poured the liquid iron into the strange pot on stilts he had set outside.

He then turned another valve on a pipe besides the strange device that had been filled with pressurized air from Siesta's bellow. As the air filled the chamber it burned from the heat of the iron consuming carbon and other impurities within the metal and releasing a nearly ten foot tall column of fire into the air. Siesta and the Farrier wondered at the sight, but Saito reminded them to continue to keep a steady pace on the bellows.

Meanwhile, Saito refilled the first pot with iron and allowed the hot air of the forge to blast it again. While the iron melted and fire continued to leap from his device outside he began carving molds for various shapes out of brick and clay. But even still he never stopped moving always pausing after each finished mold to cool the iron pot holding the molten metal, or shovel more charcoal into the forge.

About twenty minutes passed this way, and as they did people began taking note of what was happening. A ten foot tall column of fire has a way of attracting attention after all. None of the mages noticed as they had either gone to sleep or were engrossed in their arcane research but soon most of the serving staff had gathered around the Farrier's shed to see what was happening. All of them soon found themselves entranced by the sight Saito nimbly rushing about the forge literally playing with fire. Then at last the young man looked at the fire coming from his device and smiled.

He motioned Siesta away from the bellows and grabbed a chain. He set several of his molds around on the ground to one side of the large pot and pulled on the chain to tilt it out over the ground. With delicate ease he poured the molten iron into the molds filling them up to their edge till the device was empty. He then took one of the molds over to the anvil in the forge and beat on it a few time with a hammer till he emptied it into a bucket of water. When it had cooled, Charles retrieved it, and marveled. It was a simple chisel head, ready to be set in a handle and put to work. But to the practiced hand of an expert like himself, he recognized the material it was made from.

"This is steel!" He exclaimed, staring in wonder at the boy, the chisel and the strange device. "You just turned iron into steel in just under twenty minutes!"

"It's a Bessemer converter." Saito explained, indicating his device as he poured another bowl of molten iron into it, and indicated for the man to who had taken Siesta's place to resume working the bellows sending another column of fire into the night sky.

"It expose the liquid iron," He continued, "To a strong blast of air, allowing the oxygen in the atmosphere to combine with carbon and other impurities in the iron and burn them off. Ideally we should have pretreated the iron while still in a proper blast furnace to remove every scrap of slag out of it, but I really don't have the means to build a proper blast furnace yet so there's not much point in that. Still for my purposes this steel will suffice. I will have to simply make a better set of tools later."

In fact the boy already seemed to have a good set of tools almost finished. Even as he spoke he had started making handles for his other steel tools. With a few more moments he had assembled close the thirty different instruments for himself. Three different hammers, claw head, ball peen and a small narrow headed one, a number of different chisels, files, twelve wrenches, double sided of various sizes, several screw drivers of every kind and different lengths, and even a planer. All of these were now affixed in various loops about his belt or in one of the two large pouches at his size. The boy wore them comfortably, and seemed much more satisfied to have them at his side again.

Charles stared at the boy and his machine, his Bessemer converter. This thing had churned out twenty pounds of steel in just twenty minutes. The thought of it all staggered him. Steel was one of the strongest known substances in the world. Only dwarven adamantium and diamonds were known to be stronger. And it was one of the few substances that mages couldn't create themselves.

Earth mages could easily transform substances from one form to another. But the problem wasn't making iron, which was a rather straight forward spell really, it was getting it free of impurities. There was no such thing as pure iron ore, or pure copper. Every stone that came out of the ground was made of a composition of different materials. Mages could transform most of one substance into another but there was always some left behind, and other materials would be unaffected. The smaller the impurity the more focus and will power it took to remove it.

Only square class earth mages to turn iron into steel, and only in small quantities. Honestly it was easier to turn iron into gold and then buy steel from a competent blacksmith who could draw the impurities out of the ore with fire, skill and patience. But even for a master of the forge making steel took time. Gallia, a country famous for its steel, barely made more than three thousand tons of the stuff a year. If this machine was as good as it looked, Charles guessed that he might be able to make almost as much steel in the same time by himself.

This boy had just made a device that could change the entire world as they knew it, and he considered it a jury-rigged means of getting himself a half way decent set of tools. And he already had plans about how to build a better system, how to make better steel in a fast way. In fact it seemed like the boy regretted having had to resort to such an inferior system to make a few chisels out of. The thought was staggering. And Charles found himself thinking the same thought as everyone else there. Just who was this boy?

"Are we going to get in trouble for this?" Someone in the crowd asked. Saito shrugged.

"Well you aren't going to get in any trouble, since you didn't have anything to do with this." Saito said back to the nameless voice. "And if they don't like it who cares? We'll already have what we need. It's always easier to ask for forgiveness than permission."

The crowd was not reassured by this. Many of them started backing away from Saito as if his dismissive attitude was going to call down the wrath of the nobles then and there. Saito noticed this and continued, once more rolling his eyes.

"And if anyone does say anything about this you all can just point them my way, say I ordered you all to do it, and I'll deal with the nobles." The crowd seemed to accept this.

"So do you need any help?" Someone else asked, rather missing the whole point of plausible deniability.

"Oh, I'm sure I can think of something for you all to do, unless of course Mr. Charles here needs his sleep, I would hate to keep him up and worried about us breaking something in his forge."

"Now hold on here boy," Charles answered glaring at Saito and drawing up his chest. "Don't you go thinking that an hour or two on the bellows is enough to wear me out like I'm some new apprentice who still cries himself to sleep missing his mommy. I can do this all night. But I'm curious, just what do you plan to build next now that you have your tools?"

"What am I going to build?" Saito asked laughing at the question, "I have my tools, I have plenty or iron, a hot forge, a converter waiting to be put through it's paces, and a whole crowd of willing assistants. Plus I've had a rather stressful day so I'm just a hair's breadth away from entering my mad place. So the better question is, what can't I build?"

"Now man the bellows!" Saito ordered a pair of young men who literally jumped to it, "Keep that forge nice and hot. We need lots of charcoal, if there isn't enough then I need wood to make some more. Get the iron into that pot so we can start melting it. Ladies find me some sturdy planks of wood and a few long sheets of heavy paper, a few more bellows will do us some good. Hurry, hurry now everyone lets' see what this forge can really do!"

Almost all at once the crowd exploded into action, as people scattered to gather materials and fulfill their appointed tasks. Siesta looked on at Saito in admiration, she had only seen nobles give orders like that, yet there was a strange humility to his, that they lacked. No matter how different he acted he was still one of theirs. A commoner, a skilled commoner, one perhaps who could change the world, but a commoner nonetheless. Charles could hardly believe what he was seeing, and after studying Saito he suddenly spoke again.

"Who did you say you were again boy?"

"You can call me Saito."

"You have a family name to go with that one?"

"It hardly matters you wouldn't know of them. Just Saito will suffice I think."

"Humor me." Charles asked, "I wonder what short of family produces a man who considers all of this a good start."

Saito paused considering this and then he shrugged and answered.

"My ancestors have always gone by the name Heterodyne."


	2. Chapter 2: Fighting Madness

_Author's note: Well since I forgot to put one in the first chapter I'll put one here. _

_Disclaimer: I don't own Familiar of Zero or have way or intentions of profiting from it, Everyone who reads this should go out and read or watch the anime, manga or light novels. As_ _staplesdex2 noted, the character of Saito Heterodyne draws heavily from the history and mythology of the award winning web comic Girl Genius which I highly recommend to everyone. _

_His character is only inspired by that so aside from the eventual staff of destruction don't expect anything else from that series to make an appearence here, so I wouldn't really call this a crossover. Yes I am just saying that so I can put it the main section instead of the crossover section and hopefully get more views. So sue me. (Please don't actually sue me.) _

_Belomor Europa is just what they call Europe in girl genius. _

_David Hilario glad you're enjoying the read I would appreciate it though if you and others posted future reviews in English though. Google translator hates me enough for making it look up all those German swear words. _

_Thank you all for your views reviews favorites and follows. Feel free to leave any constructive criticisms you have as well as reviews. Like do you all think I use to many run on sentences? I worry about that. Right on to the madness and the Guiche fight!_

Chapter 2: Fighting Madness

Siesta was enjoying the early morning the next day. The sun had just broken the horizon and its light flooded the academy grounds. The ground was littered with the sleeping forms of most of the academy's male serving staff. None of them had woken up yet, but they had all stopped snoring at least. Siesta was sitting against a tree where she had been catching a few zees till her internal clock, honed by years working on a farm, had woken her with the dawn. It would still be some time before she really had to get to work so for now she enjoyed the quiet stillness of the morning. Indeed the world around her was calm and almost completely silent save for the strange atonal humming noise that Saito was making as he toiled away on his new mechanism.

He had been making that noise since before Siesta fell asleep. It had struck her as odd even then. She had seen men who whistled while they worked but had never even heard of one who did it while pounding away at half melted steel. The humming itself was strange to. There was no rhythm, melody, tone or sense to it at all. Saito simply made the strange noises at random intervals, stuttering back and forth like an undecided dancer half going through the steps of at least three dances at once. Strangely it wasn't unpleasant though. In fact it was rather calming all things considered. Even now when it was the only thing that could be heard, it seemed to enhance the silence of the world, highlighting the simplicity of that morning, rather than disturbing it.

It was a strange thing to encounter the first thing in the morning, perfect to finish off such a strange night. Saito had worked the crowd of willing volunteers like he worked the forge or the laundry room, with that strange chaotic efficiency. He was everywhere, speaking to everyone, giving instructions or demonstrations so that everyone was constantly doing something useful, and always finishing just in time to give another job to someone else who had just finished their first task. For a whole hour he ran and rushed about like that, then as if on some invisible signal he sat down and focused exclusively on shaping the hot steel, and everyone else had suddenly turned to Siesta and Charles for guidance. Charles had worked the forge while Siesta had worked the crowd making sure all who wanted to help had something to do. It was the first time people had come to her for any kind of leadership, she quite liked it really.

They had all labored through the night, till about four in the morning she supposed, when Saito had suddenly declared that he had enough materials to start working and had dismissed them. It would have been rather anti-climatic really, he had simply thanked them all for their hard work and wished them a good night. But half the staff just dropped to the ground, from the exhaustion of a long day and late night's worth of work, and fallen asleep. It was like a great spell had compelled them all to work so hard for so long and with few words he had released them from it.

Siesta had managed to stay awake for a short time after that and had watched Saito start making something with all the steel. Every ounce of metal they had melted and purified for him had been formed into the shapes of innumerable gears, rods, springs, screws, bolts, pendulums and other strange shapes Siesta had never seen before. The academy's chief of staff, who had joined them just before Saito handed everything over to Siesta, said it all looked like clockwork to him. He said that these sorts of parts were used to make self driving machines that could keep time or make small dolls move and dance like they were alive. It sounded all terribly exciting to Siesta, but she had the sneaking the suspicion that no doll was any where as complicated as what Saito was making.

It had started simply enough. Siesta didn't know much about machinery but she could follow Saito's work at first. It was all based around the springs. The springs would slowly unwind, governed by the strange spinning pendulums Saito could build, turning gears which turned long metal rods which turned other gears and other rods. That at least made sense. She couldn't tell what that all was supposed to actually do, but once Saito had set up one spring with about a dozen or so gears and rods all merrily spinning way he would stop and set up another spring and another set of gears. Then after he had built about four of the things he started connecting them together and that's where Siesta got horribly confused.

Within minutes Saito had turned the simple machines into a mess of gears, rods, springs and other things all tumbling together in a block of metal so dense that Siesta couldn't even see the middle of it all. Worst still she was certain that several of the springs were turning against one another, forces were clearly working at cross proposes. By all rights the thing should shattered itself or at least frozen up, but instead it just spun away while Saito, hummed to himself and made constant small adjustments to it all, with a growing smile on his face. Eventually, Siesta's eyes had started to hurt just from looking at the thing and trying to follow it all. So she had stopped and gone to sleep.

Now she could see that Saito hadn't stopped working, or even slowed down from the look of it. He had fixed his machine in between two curved steel plates, each of which looked like large round shields, so that when the plates were closed nothing of the mechanism would be visible to the world. The device itself was larger than Siesta remembered with six visible springs on its edges, three of which were slowly spinning down while three others were being wound up. He had also set a large metal tank next to all the clock work which was resting on a bed of coals from the furnace and seemed to leaking steam like a boiling kettle. But the more Siesta studied the changes that had happened the more her eyes seemed to water and hurt. Eventually all she could bring herself to look at was Saito himself. She wondered to herself if he even knew what it was he making, or if he was just making it all up as he went along, she wouldn't have been surprised either way.

Eventually Charles joined her with a cup of hot tea for her, which Siesta was grateful for. After she thanked him for it, they both remained silent for some time watching Saito work. It was very peaceful she thought, and very rewarding. Charles also looked over the forge as if he couldn't really believe it was all real.

"I still have no idea what I'm going to tell the headmaster when he sees all this." Charles declared suddenly.

"The same thing you said to him when you had to build that fake cave for that basilisk last year." Siesta offered confidently as if the headmaster couldn't actually complain about this. "Sometime we must do strange things to accommodate a mage's familiar."

"This isn't quite the same as painting some boards grey. At least then I knew how exactly it was supposed to help the poor creature, but I have no clue what he's building or why he had to completely reinvent the way we make steel to make it."

"Well you could just send them to Saito like he suggested last night."

"I wouldn't want to cause the boy any more trouble. He's gone through enough without also having to explain himself to Old Osmond."

"Maybe you can head off the problem by showing this to Professor Colbert? He's always interested in well everything. If the teachers see him hanging out over here everyone will assume this is all another one of his projects."

"That's... rather clever actually Siesta, when did you get so devious?" Siesta was rather taken back but that question. She didn't know quite how to respond, this just seemed to be the simplest solution. It took care of Osmond and kept Saito from having to deal with nobles, it solved everything. It just made sense.

"No need for any subterfuge on my account." Saito called out to them, as he closed the two steel plate together, only to then slide back four openings in the top of the metal and began to fiddle with a screw driver at something through one of the four slits. "Besides I would rather like to meet this head master fellow sooner or later, it would be a lot easier if he came to me at his convenience."

"Well if you insist, I'll point you out to them if they should come by. By the way, what do you want to do with your 'Bessemer' converter?" Charles asked.

Saito looked at the machine he had used to make all his steel. It really was a shoddy piece of work he thought to himself. He was almost embarrassed to have used it. Just some scrap metal and clay thrown together on top or a pair of wooden braces. It was a wonder the thing hadn't collapsed and killed someone beneath a few hundred pounds of molten steel. He would do much better next time. Then he burn the crude thing and never speak of it again.

"It's part of your forge Mr. Charles, made with your iron and your tools, you're free to do anything you want with it." He answered before turning back to his work. Charles grimaced, he had expected that sort of answer, the kid really didn't know just what it was that he made.

"Now listen here Mr. Saito," He started, speaking very seriously, "I don't want anyone to say I cheated you on this so let me tell it to you straight. I don't know how things were done wherever it was you were summoned from but around here we still have to purify our iron by hand. This converter of yours could change everything we know about metalworking. If you took it right now up to the capital and showed to one of the cardinal's men, he would make you a noble in exchange for it, and probably head of the smith's guild as well. You would be set for life you can't just give that away."

Saito suppressed the urge to shutter at the thought of it all. Him a noble? All his ancestors would've rolled in their graves at the thought. The only thing worse than that was the thought of being a guild master. Surely there would be no faster way to kill his creativity than that. He shook his head in response to Charles and spoke again.

"If that's true then I suggest you make a detailed drawing of this converter of mine, smash it to bits and ride for the capital on your fastest horse Mr. Charles. I wish good fortune in all your future endeavors. Me I need to get this clank up and running then see what I can do about expanding that shed to fit the blast furnace later. I also need to figure out a good source of glass making and start setting up my lab. Plus I need to scout the surrounding region to find a good spot for my secret lab and maybe a back lab as well in case the main lab and the secret lab get blown up. And I'll need to scout out the local economy so that I can make some money and pay you all if you ever try to help me again. Papa always said pay your volunteers that way they can't complain if they don't find all their limbs where they expected them the next day. After that I'll need to find a good source of..."

Saito continued to ramble on like that describing in rather well thought out detail all he would have to do to turn this prestigious and world renown academy into a prosperous industrial park. Charles could only gape at the thought of having a full blown blast furnace on campus and hadn't caught the rest of it. Siesta was like wise lost wondering just why Saito needed glass to get a dog, or why he needed to hide another one somewhere else. She decided that it would be a good time to bring the conversation back to the present.

"Well first," She suggested, "Shouldn't you get back to your mistress' side? She will be waking up soon and probably will wonder where you've been."

Saito stared at her blankly. His mind was trying to figure out why Siesta thought he had a lover and why she was so cool with him returning to her? Then he remembered about Louise. He buried his face in his hands before responding.

"That's right I have to deal with that pink haired little brat today as well don't I?" He groaned loudly after he spoke. Siesta and Charles exchanged worried looks with each other.

"I'm sure it won't be that bad." Siesta encouraged him.

"Yes it will be so much fun to convince her that just because her magic brought me here from across the boundaries of time and space she doesn't have the right to treat me like a dog." Saito responded sarcastically.

"Convincing any noble to respect the rights of the common man is a worthy goal." Charles offered, "But let's be realistic here boy. If you keep trying to deal with the mages with that attitude you're going to get struck by lightning one of these days and no amount of clever thinking is going to save you from that. I don't like it any more than you do. But they have magic, we don't. So if you try to physically defy them you're going to end up very dead boy. Best to just keep your head down and go about your business."

"Well it's not like I have many choices. Either I deal with the girl, or sell my ideas to this cardinal fellow and hope for a handout. I would just screw it all and take up banditry, but I have no idea where any of major road ways are, and I really don't feel like spending the next few months wandering about in search of them. So might as well get this over with." With that, Saito sealed up his machine, slung it across his back over top of the large wrench he had come here with and walked off towards Louise's dorm room.

"He was joking about the bandit thing right?" Charles asked Siesta after he was certain Saito was beyond hearing.

"Of course." Siesta responded hesitantly, she had been thinking the same thing, but didn't want to admit it. "Saito is an intelligent, upstanding young man. He would never really consider doing something as stupid and hurtful as that."

"I hope not." Charles responded, "Did you see how he cringed slightly when I mentioned the cardinal? I wonder if they've heard of founder Brimir wherever he was summoned from."

"You don't think he's a heathen do you?" Siesta asked shocked at the suggestion of such a thing.

"He certainly has little respect for magic so maybe. The priests say only heathens and protestants are ill mannered towards their betters."

"Maybe I should give him a copy of the scriptures..." Siesta considered, she hated the thought of such a nice young man's eternal soul being at risk.

"Maybe first you should get yourself over to the kitchens young miss maid before Marteau comes out here looking for you."

When she heard that, Siesta looked up at the quickly rising sun, and realized the time. She was late! She said a quick good bye and rushed off towards the main dining hall. Charles laughed as he watched her go. Then he rolled up his sleeves and set to work waking all the young men up and clearing off the lawn.

* * *

'She almost looks cute sleeping like that,' Saito thought to himself as he looked at the sleeping form of his would be master Louise Valliere. 'It's almost a shame to wake her up. Almost.'

"Rise and shine," Saito said as he removed the heaviest blankets from the bed and poked the sleeping girl with a wrench. "The day has already started and you'll miss most of it if you keep this up any longer."

Louise sat up in her bed, rubbing her eyes and yawning. It hadn't been nearly as cold this morning, so the day wasn't as bad as the last had been. She groggily got to her feet, while stretching in place. Saito was glad that her strategically place long hair was sparing him the sight of her naked prepubescent chest and wondered how she could stand to sleep in nothing but her panties.

"Clothes." She said pointing at the dresser, apparently assuming. Saito should prepare them for her. At first Saito considered reminding the girl that he wasn't her servant, but it was early in the morning and there was no reason for him to be rude and deny her any help at all. He shrugged and made his way over to the dresser.

Within he found a great many shirts, skirts, socks capes and various other pieces of clothing. All of them were made from fine cotton or silk, obviously high quality materials and quite expensive, Saito guessed. But they were all more or less the same colors and styles with little to no variety. Saito remembered that the previous day most of the other kids had all been wearing the same clothes so he guessed there was a uniform enforced as part of the school's rules.

Saito didn't like that. Clothing was a fundamental part of a person's identity. The first choice a man in the day was what to wear and it set the tone for the rest of the day. By removing that choice from the students, Saito couldn't help but suspect it stifled their creativity and enforced a sense of group consciousness which would be useless for study and experimentation. Did these professor's want useless students helping with their research? It all baffled him.

At least it made selecting an outfit for Louise easy enough. He gathered a set of clothes identical to what she had worn the other day and handed it back to her. She took the clothes and set them on her bed and then just stared at him expectantly. Saito shrugged, unslung his machine from his back and resumed working on it. He was almost finished with it now.

"Well?" Louise asked, as if it was obvious he should be doing something else.

"Well what?" Saito responded, "You have your clothes get dressed."

"A noble does not dress themselves if a servant is present."

"Unless your outfit requires a corset or a breastplate, you do not need help getting dressed." Saito said, rolling his eyes. This girl was pushing the limits of his politeness. "And I remind you, I haven't agreed to be your familiar yet, so there isn't a servant here. Just two people, one of whom is frightfully under dressed at this moment."

"Argh." Louise groaned. "I forgot you're being stubborn about this."

"I apologize if clinging to certain basic human decencies is causing you any inconvenience. It must be terrible hard for you, to go through the trials of the human you magically kidnapped, not throwing themselves at your feet in worshipful service."

Louise harrumphed and began to dress herself. Saito knew that last part wasn't really fair of him. She hadn't really meant for this to happen. She had just wanted a simple animal to help her and get her classmates off her back for a little while. But she had to adjust that attitude of hers if he had any hope of dealing with her. For now guilt would suffice. Satisfied, Saito returned to his work.

While she dressed, and while she was certain Saito wasn't looking at her, Louise studied the strange machine Saito was working on. She wondered where he had gotten the large metal oval and what he was adjusting inside of it. She had guessed that he was a craftsmen of some sort and now it seemed he was a smith, but she had never suspected he was this good at it. She noticed the metal was covered in small intricate etchings. They looked like letters, but a kind she had never seen before. The most prominent was a carving of what looked slightly like an insect, but one set in stone if that made any sense. She wondered at it all and felt no small amount of pride to have summoned someone who was so obviously skilled.

"So did you managed to find a place to sleep last night?" She asked, conversationally.

"No, I didn't." Saito responded, without looking up from his work.

"I can have another bed brought in here." She offered.

"That would be convenient." Saito admitted.

"So what did you do last night if you couldn't find a place to sleep?"

"I built this." Saito said, and indicated his machine.

"Impressive." Louise complimented, as she finished getting dressed and went through the rest of her morning rituals to make herself presentable. "What is it exactly? I've never seen anything like it."

"It's a carpenter clank." Saito explained. Louise didn't understand what a clank was. She assumed that once again her translation spell had failed to find an equivalent word. It was one more piece of evidence suggesting he really did come from a different world if their smiths had devices magic couldn't even make up a word for. As she finished brushing her hair she made her way to the door.

"Come on, breakfast will be ready for us in the main dining hall." She said and Saito followed.

As they made their way to the main dining hall Saito's mind, over stimulated by his work on his clank, poured over the details around him. This really was inferior stone work in his opinion, but the halls themselves were well decorated. There was just enough art work, carved arches random bits of furniture and various colored rugs to give a true sense of the wealth behind this whole place without ever quite seeming tasteless. But he had noticed a pattern to it all, and once he had it all became tiredly predictable. He focused on his would be mistress.

She did have her good points, he admitted, at least in terms of looks. She was small enough to seem vulnerable and delicate. Her features were soft which enhanced her girlish charm. Her hair had the most amazing natural curl to it that a professional hairdresser would've charged a small fortune to force into a maiden's hair. All and over her form had a pleasant innocence to it. Her stance told a different story. Her back was straight, her shoulders back, her face turned up against the world. It looked arrogant on the outset, but it reminded Saito of a cliff jutting out into the sea, stubbornly defying the constant beating of the waves laughing at them as they broke themselves against her. There was potential here. Try as he might he couldn't deny it, she had the attitude to lead but without power to back it up it was all reduced to an elaborate lie. Cliffs that couldn't hold their base together eventually collapsed into the sea in an all to spectacular fashion, after all.

As they entered the dining hall Saito felt those waves rush over him. Within moments innumerable pairs of eyes had turned on them. He could hear snickers in the distance. He could feel the judgment and haughty disapproval weigh down on him. It made him itch, and he wasn't really the focus of it all. Louise was. And she endured it with pride and determination.

They reached a nearly empty table in the middle of the room and Louise sat down in a large chair. The table was covered in food ranging from simple bread and butter to large portions of meat, soups, fresh vegetables and salads. Saito noted with disapproval that the table was devoid of snails of any kind or fruit beyond the occasional apple, but he guessed one couldn't expect all the comforts of home to be available in a foreign land.

"Impressive isn't it?" Louise noted, "If you were serving as my familiar I would of course see to it that you were well fed, but since you're not..."

"Oh I'm sure I'll be able to rustle up something later." Saito responded and took a seat next to her.

"These seats are reserved for nobles you know." Louise explained.

"Well if one comes along I'll give up my seat to them, but that doesn't seem to be an issue right now." Saito countered as Louise blushed. She often had to eat alone since the hall was more than large enough to accommodate the whole student body. Saito simply began working on his machine once again.

Louise ate in silence, mostly just noshing on a piece of bread and butter, she didn't eat much in the morning. When she was certain that Saito was once again engrossed in his work, she leaned back a bit and tried to get a look into the metal spheroid. To her wonder it was filled with clock work. She hadn't seen any since she had left her home where her father kept a few large grandfather clocks. But even the largest of them weren't nearly as intricate as what she saw within this machine.

So Saito was a clock maker then? Not quite as practical as she had hoped. But it was still a very impressive skill to possess and he seemed exceptionally good at it. Still this spheroid didn't seem like any kind of clock, so was he making some type of wind up doll then? She had never heard of one this big though. He had called it a carpenter or something so how did that all play into it? She tried to study its internal mechanism to guess at its purpose. But the more she looked at it all the more it didn't seem to make sense. She was about to ask Saito about how exactly this thing worked when a young maid girl came up to them.

"Mr. Saito!" The blond haired maid called to them as she approached. "It's good to see you up and about already."

"Ah Ms. Elizabeth." Saito answered her by name. "It's good to see you to. I hope you got enough sleep last night. They aren't working you too hard are they?"

"Don't worry about me." Elizabeth answered, "A lot of the other girls are out this morning so it's a bit chaotic here but we'll manage. Do you need anything to eat? You shouldn't work on an empty stomach you know."

"Oh you sound just like my mother, fussing like that Ms. Elizabeth. You all don't need any help do you?"

"I told you not to worry about us Mr. Saito and I really do insist you have some of this soup." Elizabeth said as she thrust a bowl of a thick meat broth and vegetables into his hands. Saito looked at Louise and took a reluctant bite to placate the concerned maid, his eyes lit up as he tasted it.

"This is delicious Elizabeth, you really are spoiling me you know."

"I'll be sure to let the chef know you liked it. But I really must be back to work. Don't work to hard now Mr. Saito."

And with that she left. Saito ate a few more mouthfuls of the soup clearly savoring it as he did. Louise wasn't certain if he was mocking her with the display or if he had just never tasted soup that good. Knowing the cooking here she decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. Still though.

"So who was that?" She asked.

"That was Elizabeth, haven't you met her before?" Saito asked as if he expected her to know every member of the serving staff. "She serves food here every day and cleans your hall way every Friday. She has family up in the capital, a father, mother, two older brother, three sisters and a younger brother. She came here to make some extra money to help with rent, plus free room and board which is nothing to scoff at. She misses her family but they really need the help since her brother haven't been able to find any good jobs. What with the new guild regulations no one's hiring unless you buy an apprenticeship and who has money for that these days?"

Louise stared at Saito silently accusing him of making all that up. How the hell did he know all that? He took another mouthful of soup and then continued.

"Honestly they're lucky her father was already in the weaver's guild so they're not as bad off as some. It's a crying shame what some people have had to go through to make end's meat. Or so I've heard."

"How do you know all this?" Louise finally asked.

"I listened." Saito explained.

"What she just told you her life story last night?"

"Well she didn't tell it to me last week if that's what you mean. Though to be honest most of what I learned I did hear by eves dropping on conversations. You would be amazed how many people think a simple iron forge is loud enough to keep people from overhearing you."

"Do you always make it a point to learn the names of the maids everywhere you go?"

"Of course." Saito answered simply, "Don't you? You should they're the ones who actually run a place like this and they know everything. Earn the respect of a working man and you will never really lose it, as my poppa used to say. That respect comes with a whole host of benefits as well. Like a free meal for instance."

"So that's your plan for the future? Mooch off the serving staff for the rest of your life?"

"YOU!" A voice cried out interrupting them before Saito could respond. The voice belonged to a large man with brown hair and broad shoulders in a typical chef outfit complete with tall white toque. Louise recognized the man as Marteau the head chef. He looked rather displeased.

"Me?" Saito asked innocently.

"You're that little git who's all but ruined my breakfast this morning!" Marteau accused. "That little ruckus you raised last night has left the whole serving staff shorthanded! Half of the girls didn't show up this morning because you left them exhausted from last night!"

"I didn't get all the girls exhausted. Only had Sophia, Isabel, Siesta, Elizabeth, Marry, Zoe, Charlotte, Audrey, Ella, Arianna, Gabriella, and Lucy were with me last night. I made sure to send Sally, Samantha, Gertrude, Matilda, Eva, and Lilly back early to get plenty of rest. They should be here to help."

"They would be helping, but they're shifts have them doing laundry this morning you idiot, and no one's seen the chief of staff this morning to change the shifts around. I've been making due with just Elizabeth, Siesta and Marry."

"Wait, you mean Martin? Tall man, pencil thin mustache, bad comb over?"

"I wouldn't say that last part to his face but yes that's the chief."

"Last I saw him he was passed out on the front lawn. He got caught between Aiden and MacMillan and ended up doing every position there was last night."

"Really? I would've thought he had enough sense to keep out of your nonsense."

"Seemed to me like he was quite experienced at my nonsense. He certainly taught the other boys a thing or two."

"Still this all your fault, so you are going to solve this." The head chef concluded as he grabbed Saito by the arm and dragged him off towards the kitchens as he clutched his machine to his chest. Louise just watched him go before sighing to herself and resumed munching on her bread.

* * *

"So the great Saito, ready and willing to defy the nobility is so easily cowed by a simple chef?" Siesta asked laughing to herself as she and Saito served tea and cakes to the students.

"Unlike nobles, chef's spend their whole day working with knives. And my poppa always said never anger anyone with unrestricted access to your food." Saito responded.

Siesta continued chuckling to herself as she went along. The nobles paid no mind to the either of them. A few were polite enough to nod in thanks as they received their tea but most barely noticed either of the two come or go. Siesta was glad Saito was keeping a level head about this. She had half expected him to raise a scene about having to serve the student anything. But he seemed to be taking it rather well. She rather hoped this meant his attitude to the nobles was all for show then. She hated the thought of him getting into any trouble with them.

As they made their rounds, Siesta saw something strange on the ground and stooped to pick it up. It was a bottle of something, but it wasn't any bottle the school's kitchen used for any drink. Saito came over to her, uncorked it and took a sniff.

"Smells like perfume." He said.

"It must belong to Ms. Montemorency." Siesta said. "She's quite the skilled potion maker and often cooks up strong perfumes for herself. We had better return it."

Montemorencry it turned out was a young girl very similar to Louise in build and looks, save for her long blond hair which seemed to curl into long tubes somehow. Her features were also a bit sharper in Saito's opinion and she lacked the same presence his would be mistress had. Saito didn't like her much for some reason so he let Siesta handle the situation.

"Excuse me miss?" Siesta humbly asked as she curtsied. Montemorency looked at her disapprovingly but nodded allowing Siesta to continue. "I found this bottle of perfume on the floor, I was wondering if it was yours by any chance?"

"This is a perfume I made," The blond girl said as she examined the bottle before scowling slightly. "But I gave it to Guiche De Gramont. He must have dropped it by accident return it to him. And tell him to be more careful in the future with such important things."

"Guiche?" Siesta asked, "I'm not familiar with the young master."

"Then you might be the only girl in school who isn't." Montemorency lamented, "You can't miss him, he has blond hair, very soft features and always carries that ridiculous rose wand of his about."

"You mean like that guy over there with the first year student on his lap?" Saito asked pointing at the very boy in question.

"WHAT!?" Montemorency cried out as she shot to her feet and looked in the direction that Saito pointed. Sure enough, Guiche De Gramont her nominal boyfriend was all but bouncing some little first year student on his legs while laughing with his friends at some inane thing he had said. Her face red with anger, the blond girl stormed off towards him with Saito and Siesta in tow.

"Guiche!" She all but screamed as she reached them. "Do you want to tell me why one of the maids found the perfume I gave you lying on the flood? Or do you want to tell me who this little tart is and what you're doing with her?"

"Montemorency!?" Guiche stuttered in surprise quickly standing up dropping the girl off his lap.

"Ouch!" The girl yelped as she hit the ground. "Guiche darling that hurt! And who is this girl?"

"Not now Katie," Guiche tried to whisper to Katie but Montemorency pressed on the attack.

"How dare you call my boyfriend darling!" She demanded of Katie.

"He's not your boyfriend, He's mine!" Katie claimed. "We're in love. Tell her darling."

"N-N-Now girls I assure you there is a perfectly rational explanation for all this." Guiche placated desperately trying to think of what that explanation was.

"Looks to me," Saito chimed in adding fuel to the fire, "Like you tried to hide your keepsake from one girl to go hang out with the other. Kind of obvious where your preferences are if you ask me. Can't really blame you."

Montemorency turned from flushed with anger to crimson with embarrassment at the implication that Guiche was leaving her. She turned it all back to anger. With a single ringing SLAP she planted a red hand print on the side of Guiche's face and stormed off.

"Wait Montemorency!" Guiche cried half running after her. "You don't understand! She means nothing to me! You're my only one true love! All others pale in comparison to your beauty!"

"Guiche! You don't really mean that do you?" Katie asked her lips quivering as his words cut her deep. Before he could respond she broke out in tears and ran away from him. As soon as she was out of earshot all the students around Guiche started laughing at him and mocking his two timing ways. Saito chuckled to himself at the sight of it all. While Siesta just stood there wondering who she should give the perfume to now.

"You! Give me that!" Guiche yelled as he snatched the perfume from Siesta and glared angrily at her. "This is all your fault! Just couldn't leave well enough alone could you? Couldn't ignore the perfume on the ground. Now because of you two girls are in tears! What are you going to do about it commoner!"

"Hey lay off her." Saito said pushing Guiche back away from the terrified maid. "Just because you messed up and got caught cheating doesn't give you the right to take your anger out on someone for doing their job."

"How dare you touch me!" Guiche shouted, shaking off of Saito's hand. "And don't think I've forgotten you either! How dare you so besmirched my reputation like that. Implying I threw away Ms. Montemorency's precious gift."

"The only thing ruining your reputation is your own stupidity." Saito said half laughing, "You have no one to blame but yourself for this whole business. So stop acting like a such a little spoiled brat and learn from your mistakes."

"I will not stand here and be so insulted by some commoner!"

"Then feel free to take a seat. You didn't get your way and now you're throwing a temper tantrum like a little baby who dropped their toy. Grow up kid."

"Why of all the insolence I have half a mind to beat some sense into you! But I recognize you commoner, your that fake familiar that Louise hired to save her reputation. As a gesture from one noble to another I will over look your transgressions in exchange for an apology."

"I wouldn't apologize to you if I had burned your house to the ground!" Saito said, his eyes slightly twitching in irritation. He didn't like this rumor he had been hired by Louise. To him it seemed like it was making light of his situation. "I certainly won't apologize for speaking the truth. Though I would love to see you try and teach me some manners. That would be sight worth paying money to see."

"Fine!" Guiche shouted, "If you won't see reason and continue to speak up to your betters then I guess I have to teach your place! I challenge you to a duel!"

The crowd around them collectively gasped at this. Duels were normally against school policy but they weren't against the law. It was always quite the spectacle to see two skilled mages square off for honor and pride. It would be another kind of spectacle to see a commoner try and fight one though. Everyone turned to Saito expecting to see a terrified peasant as he realized that he had gone too far and angered his betters. But Saito looked ecstatic.

"Really?" He asked as if he didn't believe it. "You're challenging me to a duel? You really mean that? If I accept this you can't back out right?"

"Why would I need to back out? Yes I challenged you to a due! Do you accept or will you go crying to your master craven?"

"Oh happy day!" Saito exclaimed gleefully clasping his hands together. "Oh rapturous day! This poor little aufschneider is going to let me beat the living scheisse out of him! Oh yes I accept your duel. Just tell me where and when."

"The court yard outside in half an hour!" Guiche declared ignoring the confusing words Saito was using and focusing on his acceptance. "Come face your fate if you dare little peasant."

Guiche stormed off to prepare, most of the crowd following him. As they left Siesta finally regained control of her nerves and turned to Saito. The boy still had the same wild look on his face as he began fiddling with his machine from last night.

"Saito!" She cried next to him, but Saito didn't look up from his work. "What did you just do! You could get killed or worse if you do this! Why didn't you just apologize?"

"Stop worrying Siesta." Saito said, "It'll be fine. I'll just win this fight and that will be the end of it."

"You can't beat a mage! It's impossible!"

"There's no such thing as impossible. Really Siesta if you can't at least learn that you are going to be in for a tough time staying anywhere around me."

Siesta couldn't believe it. He was actually going to do this. He was going to throw his life away in a pointless fight for no reason. She couldn't let this happen. With no other option she ran off to find Louise, hoping that maybe she could make him see reason. Saito just continued to work and his machine. After a few minutes he smiled to himself, proclaimed that it was finished and made his way over to the courtyard.

* * *

"I must admit I admire your courage to actually show up." Guiche said as Saito made his way through the ever increasing crowd and joined him a wide open circle at its center. "You may not have any sense of manners but I can't fault your honor."

"You betray your ignorance again young master." Saito responded mockingly, "I am a very well mannered man, you are simply unworthy of them. And this isn't honor, honor would be fighting you with an arm tied around my back."

"Ever defiant to the end peasant? But that ends now. Your uncouth ways and pride have insulted me and my reputation and left two girls in tears I will have justice."

"Wow and now you're acting delusional! Or you're being so stupid that you can't remember anything properly. Let me remind you though. The girls were crying because you were cheating on them, your reputation was spoiled by your own incompetence, and you already received justice when Ms. Montemorency slapped you. I admit I was a bit uncouth though, really I should've spared the good girl's hand and struck you myself if I was a true gentlemen. I guess we all can't be flawless."

"Enough of this! You will regret this!" Guiche said preparing to start the duel, but before he could formally begin, Louise broke through the crowd as well calling on them to wait.

"Guiche!" The pink haired girl yelled out, "Stop this nonsense immediately! You know duels are forbidden on school ground!"

"Duels between nobles are forbidden." Guiche countered, "This is a duel between a noble and a commoner it's completely acceptable."

"It's only not against the rules because it's never happened before. And it shouldn't happen now. What exactly are you trying to prove fighting a commoner?"

"The only thing I'm interested is restoring my reputation this rapscallion has insulted. It is too late to stop this now."

"See?" Saito said to Louise a bit too quietly for Guiche to hear. "There's no way to avoid this, so just let me kick his teeth in already and lets be done with it."

"I don't want to hear anything from you!" Louise said turning on her familiar. "Don't you realize what you've gotten into? He's going to use magic in this fight, he might kill you!"

"I know, it's very exciting." Saito explained. "I've been looking forward to a chance to see this magic of yours in a fight. It'll be fascinating to finally see what the staff is always going on about. Don't worry I won't hurt him too badly."

"No you won't hurt him, because you can't. A commoner has never beaten a mage."

"Yeah right! Unless you all know an immortality spell you're not telling me about anyone can see what a load that is. No one is invincible. Nothing is impossible." Saito intoned like he repeating an old mantra. Louise turned back to Guiche.

"Guiche this is cruel, pointless and downright evil. Stop this fight now!"

"All right, all right Louise I'll spare your familiar. If he apologizes." Guiche offered, the crowd around him groaned at the thought of the fight not happening. So Guiched decided to offer them another bit of fun instead. "And if you also admit that you're a zero who will never succeed at anything and can't even summon a decent familiar."

"I-" Louise started, and then stopped. This was the only way. She couldn't just let her familiar, a skilled, proud craftsmen and creator be abused like this! She swallowed her pride and continued. He had better be grateful for this. "I am Louise the Zero. Zero accuracy, Zero success. I never have and never will cast any spell. I am a failure of a mage."

Saito could see the small girl shake as she said those words. All around her the crowd laughed and mocked her. He could only wonder how many time those words had been thrown in her face and now she had to admit them. Deep within Saito, down in the pits of his very soul were the pure essence of his nature dwelt something raged within him. This was very, very wrong. He was getting angry.

"Wow." He said to her in a soft tone that somehow effortlessly cut through the laughing and mockery around her. "And you've put up with this for how long? I would've run from here long ago."

"A noble doesn't run from her problem." Louise responded. "Now apologize to him and end this."

"I'm sorry for this. For making you go through that for me. In the future please speak to me first before making a decision like that though. If I am your familiar then it should be my job to protect you from stuff like this. I guess this time you'll have to be satisfied with vengeance instead."

Saito turned to face Guiche who was chuckling to himself at his little joke. He looked at Saito expectantly, with his face turned up beaming with smug pride. The more Saito looked at him the more he realized that everything about Guiche just really pissed him off. He was going to enter the mad place if this kept up. For the life of him, Saito couldn't think of how that could be a bad thing though.

"Guiche!" Saito yelled out, the crowd almost instantly silencing itself. "I was just going to bloody your face a bit and rub dirt in it. You were going to get away with just a lesson about never taking your anger out on those who won't defend themselves. But now I am going to kill you. If you believe in a god than pray to him because you will be meeting him soon.

"I am Saito Heterodyne!" The young man declared, fury resounding in his voice and madness burning in his eyes. There was something else too. A frequency in his voice just out of earshot but unmistakably there. Everyone in the crowd suddenly felt like they were startled dear listening to wolves howl in the distance. Doom was coming they couldn't escape it. "Third son of Sherman The Infernal Heterodyne. No man outside of my family has seen my mother's face and lived to speak of it. My brothers are feared throughout all of Europa as bringers of death and woe. But nothing they have ever done will compare to the suffering you are about to endure! Now summon your magics and watch them wither before the power of science!"

Guiche hesitated. This was not going to script. No one had ever stood up to him like this and he had never seen anyone quite a furious as this. Fear gripped him. But what did he have to be afraid of? This was still just a commoner trying to make a fool of him. Guiche gripped his wand and spoke up.

"I am Guiche De Gramont! Son of General Gramont and I will not be spoken down to by some upstart peasant. My runic name is bronze so this Valkyrie will be your opponent."

As he spoke he flicked a single petal from the rose he was holding and allowed it to fall to the ground. When it landed there was a bright light and when it cleared a large bronze statue of a warrior woman wielding a spear had appeared. The statue began to move around and advance menacingly towards Saito. Louise recognized it as a golem, a lump of metal and earth given movement by Guiche's magic. It was a simple earth spell but a very dangerous one for a commoner like Saito

"Well Mr. Commoner, what do you think of this?" Guiche asked.

"Wow." Saito responded, the passion from earlier greatly reduced, but still there was something about his voice that left everyone on edge. "That is almost stupid enough to drag me out of my madness. That's kind of impressive really. So first of all, all the power to make anything out of bronze and give it movement and the best you can think of is a dude in armor? That's just sad man. Second the Valkyries were horsewomen, not infantry. So it's not even an accurate waste of magic. Third Valkyries didn't fight. They just gathered the souls of actual warriors and took them to paradise. So it's not even an intimidating waste of magic either. Really you should've gone with amazons or Scythians if you wanted to pull this off properly. Then again surrounding your saftladen arsch with big burly female warriors wouldn't be the most complementing thing ever."

As Saito mocked Guiche, the Valkyrie approached and took a swing at the young man's head. The golem moved with surprising swiftness for a large metal statue but Saito saw the attack coming and ducked around the punch and dropped back a few yards away from it.

"Is this really all you can do?" Saito asked. "Throw a big lump of bronze at me?"

"Mock all you want commoner but this Valkyrie of mine will never tire or weaken and when it catches you all your insults will be paid in full. What can you do against something like this?"

"Well I can match your creation with one of my own." Saito declared and Guiche laughed at him.

"What do you have that can match my Valkyrie?"

"I have a clank." Saito answered, as he removed his machine from his back and set it on the ground. Guiche watched wondering just what this strange spheroid of metal could possibly be? While he was distracted the golem remained still. Saito removed a large key from one of his pouches and inserted it into the top of his device. He turned it to the side and there was a soft clicking noise.

The clank began to tick like a loud clock and hiss with rushing steam. Slowly, four long strips of metal from the top of the machine opened up and unfolded into long spider like legs that planted themselves in the ground. The very top of the machine opened up and a round mechanical eyeball appeared from the hole that swiveled around looking at everyone. The clank the stood up with a hiss of steam. It was about four feet tall and two and half feet wide. Underneath it, three long metal arms extended themselves from its body. One of them was very thick and ended in a stump. The other two branched out at what would be an elbow joint into two more arms. One set ended in large pincer like claws, the others ended in thin metal disks covered in serrated teeth.

"What the hell is that thing?" Guiche stammered backing up from the clank slightly. "Where did you get a golem like that?"

"It's not a golem." Saito explained rolling his eyes. "It's a clank. A mechanism driven by clockwork and steam pressure. It was created by knowledge not magic and can be used by anyone. I built it myself last night. It contains a logic engine to perform certain pre-prepared actions of my own design but can do them in unique sequences as dictated by the situation. It's not the most sophisticated engine ever built, for that it would need to be much larger, but more than adequate to serve my designs.

"Allow me to demonstrate its ability. Clank C-1," Saito said to the machine which turned its great eye to focus on him and went 'BING' in response.

"Designate; those shapes equal hostile trees." Saito continued pointing at the Valkyrie, "Run: Harvest dot H E F."

The clank made a whirling noise as its eyed turned to face the golem. It looked like it was glaring at the bronze warrior while it clicked away at it. Then C-1 went 'BING' again, and with a hiss of steam it leapt through the air and drove its two forward legs down into the Valkyrie's shoulders.

The steel legs sunk into the soft bronze of the golem which buckled under the nearly two hundred pounds of steel bearing down on it. The Valkyrie dropped its spear and reached for the clank's legs with its hands. Before it could grab them though, C-1 grabbed both of the Valkyrie's arms with its pincer hand and held them in place. The two serrated disks on those same arms began to rapidly spin with a loud buzzing sound before they both bit into the Valkyrie at its elbows. Sparks flew from the Valkyrie like a shower of golden fire while all around student scattered from the flame. After a few moments the buzz saws cut all the way through and the clank dropped the Valkyrie's severed arms to the ground. C-1's other third arm then lined itself up with the golem's head. There was a burst of hot steam from the arm and a large metal bar shot out from the arm like it had been fired from a cannon and smashed through the Valkyrie's head before retracting back into the clank.

The magic that had been holding the Valkyrie together failed, and all its strength drained from its battered form. Its legs bent beneath the weight of the clank on top of it and the Valkyrie crashed to the ground. The clank pulled its legs from the fallen golem and stepped over its corpse. It studied the broken thing for a few second before turning to Saito and making a rather pleased 'CLICK, CLICK DING' noise.

"Creative, functional original and intimidating. You can see its obvious advantages over your inferior golems." Saito said happily, "Behold the power of science."

"I-I-It's certainly is impressive," Guiche admitted realizing things might not be as simple for him as he had thought. "For a commoner's creation that is. But there is only one of those clanks while my Valkyries are innumerable."

He swung his rose wand forward again and dropped another three petals to the ground creating another three golems. One carried a spear like the first, the other two had a sword and ax respectively. As soon as they were formed they rushed the clank. The ax one struck first swing a heavy blow at the machine. But C-1 leapt to the side with agile grace and stabbed the golem in the back of its knee with one of its legs. The golem fell to the ground under its own weight.

The spear golem struck next, trying to punch the machine with a mailed fist. C-1 ducked under the blow and grabbed the golem's narrow waist with its pincer hand and began tearing into it with its saw blades. The golem raise its hand and brought it down for a heavy strike while the sword golem swung at the machine from the side. C-1 quickly pulled its head into its hard shell and closed up the open slits from where its legs had unfolded and continued its work. Both blows landed with a loud clanging noise as C-1 finished sawing the spear golem in half.

As the golem fell to the ground, Guiche was shocked to see that the golem hand had smashed itself against the clank's metal shell. Likewise his third golem had snapped its sword. The clank itself was unharmed, not even a dent or scratch on its armor where the blows had landed. The clank turned on the third Valkyrie grabbing it with its two front legs like it had the first and smashing its head in with three quick strikes from its third arm.

"What is that thing made from?" Guiche demanded to know. "Even iron should've bent under hits like that."

"It's made from steel of course." Saito responded, "What were you expecting it to be made from? Tin? Just because you use inferior metals like bronze to make your constructs doesn't mean I have to."

This was a problem, Guiche realized. His golems were hollow inside to keep from costing too much will power when he summoned them. They didn't have the weight needed to bring down this steel monstrosity. And the thing was very nimble on top of all that. If he continued to focus on fighting it he might very well lose this dual. The very thought of it was revolting to him. He glanced at Saito. He needed to finish this quickly.

Drawing on as much power as he could muster, Guiche sent two more rose petal falling to the ground and summoned two more golems. One of them was much larger than the others, with heavy thick hands that looked like boxing gloves and no weapons. This Valkyrie was made of solid bronze, it was heavy and unwieldy but there was no way that the clank could easily cut through it. The other was another one of his simple hollow golems wielding a sword.

The larger Valkyrie stalked toward the clank, its heavy foot falls leaving imprints on the ground. Saito guessed this thing was much more heavily armored. He looked at his clank and called to it.

"C-1 prioritize self preservation." He ordered and the clank 'BINGed' in response. The massive Valkyrie took a clumsy swing at the little clank that nimbly leapt out of the way. The two repeated the dance moving further and further away from the two duelists. Guiche smiled, it was all going to plan. He focused on Saito and sent his second golem into motion.

Saito had expect Guiche to use the second golem to try and pin down his nimble clank while the larger one pummeled it, but instead the thing was charging after him. Saito was caught off guard and took a fist to the face and was knocked back. He spat blood to the ground. These things were tough. He rolled out of the way of the second punch and pulled a hammer from his belt. He brought the hammer down on the Valkyrie's elbow and bent its arm slightly. The golem swung its sword at the young man in response. Saito parried with his hammer and grabbed the Valkyries sword hand with his left hand trying to wrestle the blade away from him. When his hand touched the sword handle though, the runes on his hand began to glow.

Saito felt a strange energy flow through him, the world seemed to slow and a simple plan occurred to him. He brought his hammer down on the Valkyrie's forearm and broke its grip on the sword. He turned the blade in his hand back around on the golem and struck at a place where the metal seemed thin. The energy flowing through him empowered his strike and the sword easily cut through the Valkyrie and dropped it to the ground.

Guiche watched in horror as Saito pulled the bronze sword free of the bronze golem and began swinging it idly through the air. Unfortunately while Guiche was focused on Saito his other golem's movement had become even more sluggish. The small clank glided around its over sized opponent and after another clumsy strike, C-1 moved in and struck the golem's leg with its third arm several times. The golem collapsed under its own weight and C-1 began calmly cutting its head off as it struggled to get up. Before long the clank rejoined its maker's side.

In a panic Guiche sent out six more petals and summoned a whole troop of Valkyries to his defense. They all carried swords and were not as detailed as the one he had summoned before. Guiche knew he was getting tired, running out of will power he could only summon a few more golems and then he would've lost.

Saito continued to stare at his new sword and the glowing ruins on his hand. This was fascinating. He remembered that he had gotten these when Louis had kissed him. He had thought they were just simple brands to mark him as hers but now it seemed there was more to them than he had thought. C-1 nudged his side and called his attention back to the fight. Right six more of these things to get through. As things stood, Saito knew that either he with his new ruin power or just his clank alone could've beaten these things. Together, this was almost unfair. With a smile, he gripped his sword with both hands and leapt into the fray.

Louise had been watching the fight with confusion. She should've felt proud that she had summoned such a strong familiar, but something about all of this made her feel uneasy. Saito was a craftsmen, a clock maker she was certain of this now. He had made something as strong as a golem and seemed to imply that any commoner could create something like this if they knew how. That was slightly frightening, but also really cool she thought. But now he was fighting himself and that just confused her.

While most would've marveled at the inhuman speed that Saito moved with, Louise wasn't surprised. Familiars often gained powers to make them more useful to their masters. It wasn't unheard of for a wolf or lion familiar to be able to take down a whole pack of wild beasts in defense of its masters. Clearly Saito had received a similar gift. What she noticed was the practiced grace with which he fought.

He always had his guard up, he always parried with minimum effort. He never kept his back turned to one foe for too long, he always struck decisively, dealing mortal blows to the Valkyries and then raising his guard almost instantly. No movement was wasted, opening unexploited, no opportunity ever given to his foe to regroup or strike together. Even without his magically gifted speed Saito was obviously familiar enough at sword play to have held his own while his clank brought the golems down one by one. With the speed, he had killed two while his clank was dismembering a third, there was very little hope for Guiche at this point.

All of this should've been a point of pride for her. She should've been basking in the admiration of her peers as they collectively realized that Louise the Zero may have summoned the most powerful and dangerous familiar of them all. But something was making her uneasy. Something about this fight felt very, very wrong. Then it dawned on her, Saito was quietly singing to himself as he fought.

She could just barely hear him over the clashing of metal and the buzzing of the clank's saw blades. She couldn't understand what he was saying but there was doubt. Saito was singing. Now that she looked for it she saw that he was absolutely ecstatic to be fighting. There was joy in his eye and a gleeful, playful smile on his face. He moved with manic energy like a giddy maiden even as he gracefully parried and counter struck at his foes. This shouldn't be. He was fighting for his life, he was winning yes, but those golems only need one lucky hit to kill him. He should've been anxious, fearful or angry. But instead he was joyful.

Louise recalled a lesson her father, the Duke of Valliere and a former general of some renown, had told her about fighting. When men consign themselves to committing horrible things against their fellow men in battle some will try to hide from their guilt by embracing the rush of fighting. This was called the joy of battle and it was frightening to behold. Many men became addicted to it, others used it to forget themselves and bury their fears. But there were some men who used it as a way to focus their minds and allow themselves to do truly evil things without worrying their conscience. She remembered her father's warnings, and she realized that Saito was almost certainly that last kind of man.

As the sixth and final golem was dragged down and dismembered by the clank, Guiche resigned himself to defeat. There was no way he could possibly beat a man who could fight five golems at once and win. This was unfair, how was he supposed to know that the Vallieries had this kind of man at their beck and call to defend their daughter. Well he wouldn't be dishonored by this. He would use the last of his will power to summon six more golems and when they had been beaten he would yield and accept defeat. What a day, he had lost two girl friends and been humiliated by a commoner. It would be weeks before he would live this down.

He raised his wand to summon his final round of fighter and realized to late that Saito had appeared before him. The young man swung his sword in front of Guiche, slicing his wand in half stripping the noble of any ability to cast magic and leaving him defenseless. Now quite resoundingly defeated, Guiche raised his hands and closed his eyes as he tried to choke out those last hateful words.

"I- AAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" He screamed cut off mid surrender, by a sickening crack as Saito smashed his leg with a hammer.

Guiche collapsed to the ground in the greatest pain he had ever felt in his life. He grabbed his leg and felt the warm stickiness of blood. He looked down and screamed all the louder when he saw bone jutting out from the skin. Saito loomed over him, with his head cocked to one side looking at him with grim fascination of a young boy watching insects burn beneath a magnifying glass.

"Hmmm?" Saito said inquisitively those strange unnerving harmonics now back in full force making Guiche feel like an insect. "I'm sorry young master, what were you saying? I couldn't hear you over the sound of your fall."

"I-I-I-I- Ye-" Guiche stammered out fighting the pain, but before he could finish Saito kicked him in the side of his gut, knocking the wind out of him and sending pain shooting up his spine.

"No still can't hear you young master do try again. You know this duel won't be over till you give up or die." Saito said in a cheerful happy way, that grated on the skin like sand paper.

Guiche regained his breath but before he could speak, Saito kicked him in the face with his heavy boots. Guiche turned back to him and was kicked again. He couldn't get one of his eyes to open after that and tasted blood in his mouth. The noble tried to roll over and crawl away. Again Saito kicked him in the gut lifting him off the ground and dropping him back hard. Guiche could feel the exposed bone in his leg digging into the ground and pushing back against his muscles. Even if Saito let up, the pain was almost to intensive to speak through.

"He-He-Help me." He managed to whisper reaching out to his friends around him. But the awe they had felt at such an amazing upset of a fight had turned to fear and horror. The crowd that he jeered and shouted throughout the fight was now deathly silent, paralyzed by Saito's cruelty, hypnotized by the strange terror inducing furry in voice.

"What was that young master?" Saito said leaning over the fallen noble. "You need help? With what young master? Do you need help standing up? Yes I can help with that."

Saito grabbed the young man by the throat with his right hand and lifted Guiche up off the ground and held him in the air. Guiche looked down on his tormentor through his one good eye and shuddered. For the first time Guiche learned what it was like to stare death in the eye. That wild passion, that gleeful smile. This was no mere taunting. Guiche realized that Saito had spoken the truth when the fight started. He was going to die here. Saito dropped him from his grip and Guiche's legs folded under the weight as the shattered bone inched its way further out of his leg. Guiche was left screaming on the ground.

"Oh come now young master." Saito said as if he was disappointed in Guiche. "If you can't stand up how are we going to finish this little duel of our? You really need to put more effort into this. I'm the only one doing any work at all right now. Well if you're just going to lay on the ground crying to yourself I guess I'll have to help you some more. C-1 lift this lazy log up will you?"

The clank stalked over to Guiche's screaming form, grabbed his arms with its pincers and lifter him off the ground. Saito grabbed Guiche's face in his hand and turned the boy to look him. Guiche wished he had the strength do something cool like smile in the face of death or spit in Saito's. But all he could manage was to quietly sob to himself.

"Really young master, you should be grateful to me for giving you so much help. I'm really giving you a hand here. But you do know this is only a loan right? And a loan requires surety you know. C-1 why don't you take those arms of his as proof he's going to pay me back one day."

Guiche closed his eyes and gritted his teeth waiting for the pain as he heard the buzz saws spin up mere inches from his ears. This was the end then. The slow painful, disgraceful end. Guiche's mind took that moment to reflect on its short life preparing to give an account of itself to founder Brimir. As it did he realized that there wasn't much of it he was at all proud of really. Least of all this whole day. That was horribly depressing. Almost depressing enough to make him forget his mounting terror at the thought that his arms were about to be cut off.

"STOP."Someone cried from the crowd. Saito grimaced to himself. That shouldn't be possible, he had the crowd in the palm of his hand. Everyone should be to shocked, terrified, and morbidly fascinated to do anything to stop him. Who would dare interrupt his work now? He turned about face full of anger and rage to see his would be mistress standing defiantly before him. He was shocked for a moment as she railed against him.

"That is quite enough! This stupid duel has gone on for to long! If you keep this up any longer you are going to kill him!" Louise shouted, hoping to snap her familiar out of it and bring him back to reality.

"Well yes," Saito said he voice dripping with madness and cruelty, "That's kind of the point. I wouldn't go through the trouble of smashing someone's leg if I didn't mean to kill him."

"You're going to what?!" Louise asked shocked, he couldn't really mean that could he?

"Oh don't look so surprised." Saito said dismissively as if killing wasn't that big of a deal. "I'm going to cut his arms off, beat him with them till he bleeds out. Then just as he starts to lose consciousness I'm going to take one of his spears and shove it through his gut and lift him up in the air with it. Maybe shake it up and down and few times to get him good and stuck on it. Them I'm going to cut his head off, burn his body, use the ashes to grease my future machines and nail his head to the academy gate. Really I think it's all rather self evident by this point. What else would I do with him now?"

"Why?" Louise demanded to know, "You've already won, you've proven your point just end this already."

"My point? Who said this was about proving a point? This little Schiesskerl was going to beat me within an inch of my life for having the audacity of standing nearby him while he was in a bad mood and daring to not roll over and just take his abuse. And every single one of these little Saftsacks were going to stand here and laugh while he did it. Thinking to themselves that I deserved it. Well now they're going to watch him die and can laugh at that!"

"And then will you be satisfied? Will your vengeance against his intentions be complete? You'll be no better than him after this and then where will your justice be?"

"My dear young mistress please don't delude yourself. I'm not trying to be better than him. This isn't about justice or vengeance. But this is going to be fun!"

Louise gasped at what her familiar had just said. After all this was done, and the students tried to rationalize this fight and shut away its darker implications from their minds, they would all conclude this had been an elaborate act. That Guiche had been bribed or black mailed into helping Louise and had made the clank for Saito and allowed himself to be beaten up. But Louise would always remember the truth. She would remember the look in Saito's eyes and would always know that he had every intention of killing Guiche today and needed no better reason to do it than the shock such an act would produce in the school. She shuddered at it all. Saito thinking her hesitation to be the end of her courage turned back to Guiche to finish this once and for all.

"NO!" Louise shouted again stopping Saito once more. "I will not allow this! I will not have a murderer for a familiar!"

Saito laughed derisively. "You should've told your magic that before it summoned me here. This isn't the first Arschlock I've put in the ground and he won't be the last!"

"What you've done before doesn't matter now!" Louise declared not about to let anything stop her now. "YOU are MY familiar and I order you to stop this now!"

Saito stopped laughing and glared at her. How dare she? How dare she still try and order him around even now? How dare she come here to where he ruled over the crowd and challenge him like this? Didn't she realize just how little power she had here? Didn't she realize how easily he could have her head nailed to the door? Of all the pride and arrogance! To challenge him like this when she had nothing that could stop him!

"C-1." Saito said to his clank, his eyes baring down on Louise with all the anger he could muster. "Cut the boy's arms off."

The buzz saws whirled back to life and slowly inched down towards Guiche's arms. Louise could see the sight in her head even then. The shower of blood, the screaming, the slow agonizing death to follow.

"NO STOP!" She ordered, bending her will against the world itself trying to undo the cruelty of reality. And to her amazement, the buzzing stopped. Silence reigned over the school for several seconds before Saito rounded on his machine.

"I gave you and order C-1!" He shouted.

"Click, click, DING ding DING bong." The clank responded, its eye shaking nervously.

"What do you mean 'user order conflict'? My orders trump all others follow them!"

"DING Bing, BING click, click whirl." The machine sounded out its eye glancing back and forth from Saito to Louise.

"She does not have admin privileges!"

"Click DING."

"How did she get them?"

"Click bong."

"I did no such thing! When did she get them?"

"Click, click, click, click, click, click, DING, Click, click, click, click, ding, click, click." C-1 sounded off.

"But I would've been in my full mad place then I would never have done anything so stupid as..." Saito trailed off and looked back at Louise, much more critically than furiously this time. Louise had no idea what was going on but her order had stopped the clank, so maybe...

"C-1," She said proudly, pointing in the direction of the main school building. "Take Guiche to the school nurse at once!"

The clank began to move dragging Guiche with it. Saito was not having any of this though.

"C-1 hold this position!" He ordered and the clank stopped. It looked back and forth from Saito to Louise in a nervous fashion.

"Click, click, DING, ding, DING bong." It said repeating its user order conflict message from earlier.

"At least your creations have some sense to them." Louise said, "Now stop this madness! I will not let you kill Guiche!"

Saito pulled himself up to his full height with his sword raised up and anger in his eyes once more. He seemed to tower over the small pink haired girl. The crowd held its breath. Louise steeled herself for what was to come as Saito prepared to lay into her. But he hesitated.

In the depths of Saito's mind there was a small part of him which remained coldly logical in the face of everything happening around him. No matter how angry or joyous or even blood thirsty the rest of him got there was always that small part of his mind intently studying the world around him. And now it presented its report to the higher portions of his mind.

It explained to him that things were getting out of hand. Saito was at this moment trying to commit murder in the middle of the day, in the middle of a mob of people with powers beyond his understanding. The only way this could possibly end well was that the sheer audacity and charisma with which he had conducted himself so far had left them all paralyzed and passive. But now he was wasting time arguing with the very least of them all. A girl who by her own admission couldn't do any magic was standing up to him and he was actually treating with her. If this kept up much longer the crowd was going to be shamed into action and that would not end well for him. He had to end this now.

Either he had to kill Louise, kill Guiche or release him. At this point killing Louise would almost certainly shock the mob awake and he would have to fight his way out of here and he wasn't certain he could do that. So that left killing Guiche or releasing him. Now then what did he gain by killing Guiche?

Precious little really. Louise was right he had made his point. He would never have to worry about any of the nobles looking down on him or getting in his way again. It would be much less fun of course but sometimes fun had to take a back seat to the needs of his other goals. What did he lose by sparing Guiche? Again very little. His only goal that would be set back by this was his upcoming confrontation with Louise over this whole familiar business. If he gave in now she would think she could order him around and get away with it which would give her more confidence in said confrontation. But this loss was offset by the fact that now Louise knew there was no way she could force him to do anything and the fear that she would experience knowing he could and would kill her over the slightest thing. So no major losses there.

Finally what did he gain by sparing Guiche? In the short term nothing, but in the long term. Saito had to admit that having someone out there with ability to will simple metals into existence absolutely terrified of him had a lot of potential advantages. Especially when he started making guns and would need a steady supply of brass for shell casings. More importantly it left Louise slightly beholden to him and that had potential.

Now that he stopped and considered her, Saito was actually rather impressed with Louise right now. From here he could see her slightly shaking, how she had positioned her feet to be able to easily turn and run. How desperate she really was for this to work. He had called her arrogant to confront him here but now he saw the truth. This wasn't arrogance, this was sheer courage in the face of overwhelming fear.

Louise knew she had no power over him. She knew that there really wasn't anything she could do right now. She had no magic, he owed her no loyalty, she wasn't strong enough to do anything to him she had nothing. But she tried anyway, because she had to do something. She had no idea how this could possibly work but she tried anyway. This was pure audacity.

All of this passed through Saito's mind very, very quickly. To the world it seemed like paused only for a moment, and then slowly a smile seemed to grow on his face. Not an angry or even a joyous smile. This was the smile of master sword fighter watching his opponent limp, a smile of the inevitably victorious. It was very disturbing.

"And why do you even care about him?" He asked Louise in a damn near seductive voice that somehow still managed to put the fear of god into her. "He has mocked you, he has hated you, hurt you for what? Over a year now? And these people, had I lost they would've laughed at you just like they always do. What do you owe to any of them? Why do you care if they live or die?"

"What they have done or haven't done means nothing." Louise declared. "What you are doing is wrong and if I will stop it."

"If I kill this boy they will never dare to do any of that ever again. Can you imagine that? Everyone who has ever mocked or laughed at you standing before you cowering in fear of you. They will all know that you are a mage without equal and if they dare to cross you their fate would be swift and bloody."

"I don't want anyone afraid of me!" Louise all but shouted. "And I don't need you killing anyone to stop them. I will prove I am a great mage MY WAY. And they will respect me for it! You will respect me!"

Saito laughed again. But not a mocking laugh a long happy laugh of someone who has found something they have long sought out. He looked at her hungrily. Louise felt that like she was being weighed and measure but for the first time in her life, she felt like she wasn't coming up short.

"And how will you do that I wonder Ms. Zero. It's almost worth sparing this fool to find out. Yes we have a lot of business to conduct together Ms. Louise Francoise Le Blanc De La Valliere, and I don't think I want to waste the opportunity. Fine I won't kill him. For now."

The crowd around them sighed with relief as the tension of the situation began to fade. Louise almost fell to her knees, but she held herself proudly. Her familiar had listened to her. He had actually listened to her! Then Saito grabbed Guiche by the scruff of his neck, lifted him off the ground and dragged him over to Louise. Guiche who had nearly passed out from the pain, and was astounded to still be alive right now looked at Louise in awe. Saito shook him.

"All right you miserable excuse for a man." Saito said to Guiche, "My mistress has just spared your life in spite of all you've done to her for the last year including making her say those awful things just now, for reasons beyond my comprehension. So I think a little bit of gratitude and an apology is in order."

"Th-Th-Thank you Ms. Louise." Guiche managed to say. "I'm sorry about, well everything."

"Good enough." Saito declared before Louise had a chance to respond. "If you have any sense you'll get used to making apologies now, and as soon as your well enough to crawl you'll drag yourself over to those two girls you cheated on and beg them to forgive a miserable excuse for a human being like yourself. Now get out of my sight."

Saito then threw Guiche into the crowd around them with no more thought to it at all. A quick thinking wind mage quickly cast a levitation spell and caught Guiche in the air and sent him drifting in the direction of the school nurse. Saito then sank the bronze sword into the ground and released it. The moment he did the ruins on his hand stopped glowing. He felt very tired now, but he mastered himself and looked expectantly at his would be mistress. The implications were clear; now they needed to talk.

Louise nodded, turned and walked away through the crowd which parted before her in near reverence. Saito followed her, and the crowd drew further back in fear. He stopped half way through and called back to his clank.

"Well come on you bucket of scrap metal." He yelled. The clank looked after Guiche and back to Saito, it had been given orders after all. "Oh for the love of... Look the situation is resolved come with me now, or I'll come over there and tear out your logic engine myself!"

The clank looked startled. Then it scuttled after him and Louise keeping its body low to the ground. Before long the three were out of sight. And before even then rumors began to fly around campus like swarming insects. Strange things were a foot at the Tristain Academy of Magic. But no one could've guessed just how great and powerful the tides of fate were that now were at work in the world. A meeting of two people was about to take place that would change the course of history as they all knew it. Soon things would never be the same again.


	3. Chapter 3: Mastering Madness

Chapter 3: Mastering Madness

"I want to reassure you Ms Valliere, that you aren't in any trouble." Old Osmond said for about the third time since they had been called into his office. Initially Louise was going to find some secluded spot to have a heart to heart with her familiar and find out what was wrong with his head. But before they could've even hoped to begin, the two of them had been summoned to Old Osmond's office. Osmond was a very, very old man with a grey beard and a weathered, ancient look to his eyes. It was widely believed that he was over three hundred years old and the man had been in charge of the academy for as long as anyone could remember. Louise liked the old man, it was hard not to.

"Yes, we simply want to know exactly what happened and how Mr. Gramont ended up so badly injured from a simple duel." Professor Colbert added.

Louise wasn't particularly reassured by their statements. Partly because she knew that she and her familiar really were in trouble and partly because she knew they deserved to be. Mostly, though it was because she actually did know why Guiche was so horribly injured and they were making her dwell on it when she would just as soon forget.

Guiche was injured because not thirty minutes before her familiar had broken his leg with a hammer and kicked his face and gut repeatedly in preparation to violently murder him. She knew this for a fact because she had been forced to stand there and watch him do it. It wouldn't be something she would soon forget. In fact the whole event had been quite permanently burned into her memory.

She didn't know what was the worst part of it all. That sickening cracking sound Guiche's leg had made when the bone broke through the skin. The madness of her familiar's declaration that he was doing this for the sheer insane fun of it all. The sight of that clank's saw blades slowly drawing closer and closer to Guiche's arms. No that wasn't quite right she knew what the worst part of it was. The worst part was that while she had managed to get her familiar to back off she had no idea how she'd done that.

Her familiar in question was sitting just a little way behind her. Saito Heterodyne, or so he had introduced himself, looked like a rather normal, simple, young man. At the moment he was doing normal, simple things like drawing in a sketch book, or fiddling with the clank that followed him everywhere. But now Louise knew that this simple looking face was hiding the mind of an absolute sociopath.

He had been ready to kill Guiche, she was almost certain he had been about to kill her before he suddenly gave in to her demands. But he had had no reason to do that. She couldn't even compel him to help her get dressed in the morning, hell she couldn't even get him to admit he was her familiar. How on earth had she managed to get him to not kill her?

The fact that Louise couldn't answer that question set up some serious red flags in her mind. What if he did this again? What if someone else accidentally crossed him or he turned on the serving staff? What if he turned on her? What could she do to actually stop him if he did?

The sensible thing to do right now was to tell these two professors about all her fears. To try and convince them that Saito was dangerous and needed to restrained or even executed. If things got out of hand later it might not be as safe to talk to them again. Right now Saito was tired, distracted and the school was still sympathetic to Guiche's plight. Now would be the best time to try and get Osmond to put Saito away. But...

Saito had won his duel. A commoner, a man who didn't even believe magic was real the first time Louise spoke to him, had beaten a mage in a one on one fight. No one had ever heard of such a thing happening. And Saito had done it convincingly. His little clank had chewed through seven golems without taking a scratch. Saito himself had killed four more golems with nothing but a sword. He was strong, blindingly fast and exceptionally skilled at sword play. Louise didn't doubt that he had some kind of military training or experience. Combined with the power up the familiar ruins on his left hand had given him, Louise didn't doubt that Saito could very well beat a line class mage with ease and maybe even fight on par with a triangle class mage.

He was everything she had asked for in a familiar. Impressive, powerful and rather easy on the eyes she had to admit. At first she had thought that he was merely a craftsmen who would be a useful to impress guests or a servant to do chores and work around the house. Now it seemed she had a first class guardian to watch out for her.

He was still an enigma to her though. The fact that he clearly had fighting experience shifted her whole view of him. Now she suspected he was some kind of combat engineer, in charge of producing and leading these strange clanks into battle. And if he was a soldier could she really blame him for the violence he had used against Guiche?

The Valliere family maintained no illusions about battles being places to win glory and honor. Her father had told them the simple truth. Wars were all evil, they made men commit senseless acts of cruelty to one another in the name of survival. Moral men hesitated, died and put their friends in danger while doing it. Either soldiers convinced themselves that their enemies were evil and needed to be killed or they abandoned all conception of morality and fought on for money or the rush of killing. To make matters worse for Saito he seemed a little young to Louise to be fighting. If his homeland was embroiled in such conflict they were recruiting such young men into the army then the war itself must have been particularly savage. No doubt it all would've been traumatizing for Saito so of course he assumed that a fight with Guiche had to end in death. His would've been a world of death.

But he had stopped at her order even though he had no reason to. He must have stopped because of her, she didn't know why but that hardly mattered really. If she had stopped him once that it was logical to assume she could stop him again right? And if she could help him somehow, heal him of his aggression and refocus his creativity for constructive purposes didn't he have the ability to make the world a much better place? Didn't she at least owe him a chance at that?

In addition to that Louise had to admit that his clank was nothing short of a work of art and there was no reason why she should throw it and whatever else he could build away just because their maker was a little bit crazy. The blood of innumerable generals, heroes, and conquerors of the Valliere family that flowed through Louise veins turned ice cold at the thought of it all. Besides he was her familiar. He was her responsibility, not anyone else's.

While Louise had sat quietly mauling all of this over in her head Osmond and Colbert had been going over the events of that morning as they understood them. Louise hadn't been listening to them too caught up in her own internal debate. When she had finally made up her mind she caught the tail end of their preamble.

"And well before this goes any farther." Old Osmond said, "We would like to hear your side of the story."

"Well obviously it's all Guiche's fault." She declared as soon as Osmond had finished and before they could ask her anything.

"Ah." Colbert noted, "So he broke his own leg then?"

"He may as well have." Louise countered without missing a note. "Honestly it's amazing he hasn't done much worse to himself already if he's been behaving in such a stupid manner as this his whole life. First of all this whole duel was his idiotic idea in the first place.

"He was acting illogically from the beginning. Just because he finally got caught in his two timing ways, and Montemorency finally had the good sense to dump him, Mr. Gramont decided to make a complete fool of himself and take out his anger on a helpless maid. Can you believe that? For a noble, who are supposed to be veritable paragons of good manners and wisdom to have acted in such a petty and spiteful way to someone who had been trying to help him? It's little wonder the world is the shape it is if this the state of modern nobility."

"True enough." Saito agreed from behind her covering up her slight pause for breath and keeping either of the two adults from regaining the reigns of the conversation. "These are sad, sad days that we live in aren't they?"

"Indeed." Louise said shaking her head as if ashamed by it all, then she continued. "Then when my familiar had the decency and kindness to tell Guiche what a complete oaf he was acting like he then turned the one person actually helping him and challenged my familiar to a duel. An actual duel, can you believe that?"

"Um what was your familiar doing there when all this happened?" Professor Colbert asked inquisitively, "And what were you doing at that time?"

"She wasn't there when I was challenged," Saito supplied, "I had been helping the serving staff serve breakfast. Apparently there was some kind of ruckus last night and they were a bit short handed today."

"If I had been there I assure you I would've put a stop to this whole business before it could've started." Louise said, "Of course since I wasn't, my familiar had no choice by to defend his honor and accept the duel. Fortunately the maid that Guiche had all but assaulted came and found me.

"Once I found out what was going on I tried to stop it at once. But Guiche was still being a fool and insisted on fighting. I offered him every chance to end this peacefully and I told him what an idiot he would seem like if he fought a commoner. The only thing that would make him stop the whole business was if my familiar apologized and if I let Guiche taunt and insult me. I was even willing to bear through all of that if it meant keeping the peace but one can hardly expect a familiar to remain quiet when their master was being so rudely treated. So of course Saito had to fight at that point. And of course he won."

"Yes," Osmond intoned, "That he won the fight is very clear. What is also clear is that in the process of winning he had to break Guiche's leg, jaw and two ribs. He also declared before the fight that he would kill the child and seemed to have every intention of following through on that threat."

"Of course he seemed like he was going to kill Guiche," Louise responded in an even and calm tone implying that great logical thoughts were about to be said. "Nothing short of any of that would get Guiche to yield and give up. If Guiche had any sense at all he would've gracefully bowed out when his first golem was beaten by my familiar's clank. But of course he had to act like a complete dunce.

"No I take that back, if he was acting like a dunce then he would've given up the moment that Saito defeated a golem by himself. At that point any idiot could've realized that there was no way to win that fight. But no, Guiche had to act like a total nitwit and summon more and more golems and make it clearer and clearer to my familiar that he wasn't dealing with a rational individual. So of course he had to take drastic measures."

"Yes drastic measures," Osmond said once again, "Such as beating Guiche whenever he was about to speak, which may have had a detrimental effect on his ability to surrender."

That was true, Louise had to admit. Her familiar had very deliberately taken steps to keep Guiche from surrendering until he had a chance to kill him. Her mind raced for an explanation.

"Well he couldn't let Guiche speak, after all he was a commoner fighting a mage. So he had to take whatever steps were necessary to keep Guiche from casting a spell on him."

"How very cautious of him. Especially after he had already gone through the trouble of destroying Guiche's wand thus completely disarming him of all magic." Louise internally cursed as Osmond pressed on, she had forgotten about that.

"So a mage can't cast magic without a wand?" Saito asked sounding genuinely surprised. "So then is the wand itself the source of magic? Or is it enchanted to enhance and guide magic? Does it have to be specifically wand shaped or will any random stick or staff work? Does that mean there is a natural connection between magic and Si Vitea energy?"

Saito would've gone on in all likely hood but Colbert managed to calm him down with promises to answer his questions later. Osmond looked at Saito inquisitively, that a magic wand was needed to practice magic should've been common knowledge. Louise shook her head and answered Osmond's unasked question.

"Saito says he was summoned from rather far away." She explained leaving out that he claimed to come from another world entirely. "He knows almost nothing about magic."

"So Saito," Osmond said directly addressing her familiar for the first time. "You mean to tell me that everything you did, was all done to end the fight as quickly as possible?"

"It is as my mistress said." Saito said while smiling reassuringly. "I was only interested in ending the fight."

"Well then, works for me." Osmond said returning Saito's smile. "Thank you two for your time. Please enjoy the rest of the day."

As the two of them left, Colbert exchanged a worried look with Osmond.

"So that was the legendary familiar Gandalfr?" Osmond asked of no one in particular. "He seemed shorter than I would've thought."

"There is no doubt. I looked up the ruins on his hand myself." Colbert explained, "They perfectly match the ruins of founder Brimir's main fighting familiar, the Left Hand of God."

"He certainly seems dangerous enough to be a Gandalfr." Osmond admitted. Saito's fight with Guiche had been one of the most brutal the old man had ever witnessed. "I wonder how much of that is just the familiar himself and how much comes from those ruins?"

"It's hard to say. The only thing known about the last Gandalfr was that it could use any weapon and could fight a whole army of mages on its own."

"Your certain he has no magic of his own?"

"I am sure, I ran a detect magic spell on him when he first arrived here."

"Then where did he get that golem from? Why did that golem also listen to Ms. Valliere? And if he has no magic of his own how did he become a Gandalfr? What does that mean about our little zero success student?"

"You don't suppose that she could be a void mage do you?" Colbert asked in surprise. Osmond rolled his eyes. If the girl had a Gandalfr as a familiar then of course she was a void mage. It certainly explained a great deal about her failure of an education.

"Who can say?" The old man asked. "Anyway we should keep a close eye on those two from now on."

"If she is a void mage maybe we should adjust her curriculum a bit..." Colbert said thoughtfully.

"No!" Osmond said emphatically. "We don't know if she is a void mage and trying to teach her to be one could be disastrous beyond measure. Besides no one knows what any of the void spells were so there is nothing we can really teach her anyway. For now we act like nothing has changed is that clear?"

"Yes headmaster." Colbert said and made for the door, he still had much work to do that day. Osmond sighed as he left. Good; he hadn't questioned that last order. If the world was very lucky Ms. Valliere would never learn to control her powers and remain a failure of a mage. The last thing the world needed right now was the void magic waking up again.

* * *

Louise could hardly believe that they had gotten way from that unscathed. She was certain that they would be called back to receive actual punishment any moment now. But they weren't though and soon she made her way out of the main building and over to a set of benches set up under a tree. She took a seat at a table in shade, while her familiar sat opposite of her in the sun, and the clank that had followed them all day now nestled itself under the table and sat there comfortably.

"That went well." Saito said out of the blue.

"Yes we were very lucky that they believed us." Louise said sighing with relief that they were past that.

"Luck had little to do with it. You handled that expertly I would say."

"We will need good luck to keep it up though. If Guiche contradicts our story we could get into real trouble later."

"What Guiche says won't matter, they already knew everything that happened. They were just questioning us to see how we responded."

Louise considered this. Osmond did seem to have the perfect question to follow up on her. It was possible that he had heard about the fight and scried on them to see what had happened. But if that was the case why had they gotten away with it at all? Did they really just want to know how she would react to their questions?

"If I might offer a word of advice?" Saito said interrupting Louise's thoughts, "In the future it would be best to only lie as a last resort. Lies are easy to fact check and do more harm than good in the long run. If you need to deceive someone its best to tell them a half truth to satiate their curiosity while distracting them from the full truth. In this case it would've been better to say I got caught up in the moment to explain Guiche's injuries rather than saying I wanted to end the fight quickly. Not much of mistake really but we should always look for ways to do better."

The incongruity of that last statement struck Louise in full force. Yes she supposed she might need to get better at lying if she meant to keep Saito as a familiar. She could just imagine how that might go with her parents. 'Hello mother let me introduce you to my sociopath familiar Saito, he one nearly murdered one of my classmates in cold blood.' Yeah that would end brilliantly.

"I'll keep that in mind." She answered, "Thanks for the advice. So why were you going to kill Guiche?"

"I got caught up in the moment." Saito replied grinning, Louise glared at him in response. While they spoke one of the maids came up to them with tea and cakes for the afternoon. Louise graciously accepted the food since she had missed lunch now. She recognized the maid as Siesta the girl who had told her about the duel in the first place.

"There is some truth to that statement." Saito continued as he shoveled sugar into his tea. Four spoonfuls Louise noted, at least he had the courtesy to offer her some when he had finished. "Like it or not, I wasn't lying back there. Guiche would not be the first man I killed. In fact I think he would've been number sixty two unless my count is badly off. I am a violent man Louise, from a violent family and a violent country. Violence solves problems; after all you can't have conflict with just one person."

"You said you were going to kill him before the fight started." She pressed, he may have given into the excitement of the fight but that wasn't the only reason she bet.

"Well the boy was also an idiotic, incompetent, prideful mistvieh. He was acting like a child, taking his anger out on one of mine. And he thought that just because he was a noble we both should be glad to have received his reproof. Plus frankly I needed a way to blow off some steam. This whole world irritates me. The senseless classism, the obvious stagnation, the unsubstantiated pride and worst of all, people keep underestimating me! Add on to the fact that he was a bully who exploited your kindness for a cheap laugh and you can see how I saw no reason to hold back from just enjoying myself and mutilating a corpse for a few minutes. Also it was a great opportunity to try out the clank's self defense protocols."

Louise found she couldn't really argue with any of those points. She didn't think that any of them, or even the sum of them, were good enough to justify killing him. But if Saito did see them that way, it led to her next question.

"So why didn't you kill him?" She asked slightly dreading the answer.

"You asked me not to." Saito said with a shrug.

"I also asked you to help me get dressed today and you didn't do that."

"Because you don't need help getting dressed. Honestly of all the pointless, wasteful extravagance getting a servant to dress has to be the most useless. Though I see what you mean. But it is true if you hadn't spoken up I would've killed him. You made me stop and think. You were right I had made my point but beating him senseless and I realized I had nothing to gain from killing him and some benefit to get from leaving him alive. Or to simplify it for you. You gave an order worth following, so I did."

"And is that how our relationship is going to work?" Louise demanded to know. "You constantly second guessing every order I make to decide if it's worth your time to follow?"

"It's a better deal than most get." Saito countered. "Heterodynes bend knee to no one. And most people who try to make us give in end up very, very dead."

"Oh come on." Louise scoffed, "There's bravado and family pride but that is ridiculous. Surely you all follow your own nation's laws right? You said you were part of Austria or something. Everyone owes fealty to some king."

"I said it was all politically nebulous and for good reason. The last five or six kings who tried force our submission ended up very, very dead. Now whenever they swear in a new king he very pointedly notes that Mechanicsburgh is most certainly not part of their empire." Saito said beaming with pride.

Louise stared at him dumbfounded. He couldn't really be serious could he? He couldn't really be proud of the fact his family had committed regicide? Wait, how did one family manage to commit regicide in the first place?

"You know it occurs to me," Louise said, "That I really don't know anything about you."

"No you don't." Saito confirmed, "What would you like to know?"

Louise paused thinking this over for a bit. This really was the first time she had had to ask about someone's past. Everyone she had ever known she had either grown up with or had them explain themselves to her, in some cases weather she wanted them to or not. There was a lot to ask she realized, she decided to start with the most pressing in her mind.

"So what the heck is this little 'clank' of yours anyway?" She asked tapping the machine under the table with her foot. "I've seen clockwork dolls before but never anything this big... Or one that can move so fluidly... or one that can respond to questions you ask it... or one that fights for that matter."

"And you probably won't ever see one that can." Saito explained. "A clank isn't a doll. Dolls can only perform movements that were built into their mechanisms. They can only physically do certain things and will always do them in exactly the same way until they break. But a clank is different. A clank contains a device called a logic engine that allows it recognize certain sights and sounds and react differently according to what it sees and hears. In other words it can analyze the world around it and adjust its behavior accordingly."

"You mean it can think on its own?" Louise exclaimed looking down at the machine under the table with a new sense of wonder. Even golems were merely extensions of their mage's will. While they could act on their own to an extent, they could only follow their last instructions and would break completely if left on their own for two long or if they traveled to far away from their mage.

"Sort of." Saito answered, "They can only move in the ways their parts allow them to and the engine itself has to be designed to recognize certain sights or sounds and respond to them in specific ways. The more possible responses you build into the engine the larger and more cumbersome it becomes. For instance if you threw fruit at C-1 he wouldn't react to it all, even if he was damaged by it because I never told him how to respond if someone throws fruit at him."

"That's still amazing. How does it work?"

"That's the tricky bit," Saito said sounding a bit exhausted. "No one really knows. Mechanically speaking the logic engine uses mirrors and wires to notice sights and sounds and based on them redirects power from the clanks engines to different limbs in different ways to perform its various functions. But no one knows how light hitting a mirror triggers the logic engine to change itself. Some researchers think that the mirrors resonate when struck by specific light frequencies. But no one has been able to get a mirror to behave that way outside of an engine. And to make matters worse logic engines don't function properly if you watch them while they work. Which just opens up a whole other can of worms."

"But obviously you know how they work, I mean you built one inside of C-1 right?"

"No I haven't a clue. I know it uses polished steel for mirrors, thin plates to detect sound and has twenty six major command functions which is rather impressive to a clank its size."

"So you built a solid steel killing machine controlled by a device even you don't understand?" Louise said sounding very frustrated by this. "How do you even build something if you don't know how it works!"

"Well obviously I'm a very strong spark." Saito said as if that answered everything. He then continued before Louise could ask the obvious. "And it's not a killing machine, C-1 is a carpenter. Watch."

When he finished speaking, Saito stood up and pulled a dead branch from the tree they were standing under. To Louise it looked more like a log really, about as thick as Saito's leg and as tall as he was. The wood was still a bit green, it must have broken off during one of the early spring storms. Saito passed it back from hand to hand a few times then nodded at it.

"C-1." He said to the machine under the table which immediately rose up at the sound of its name. "Scale model: house use only the provided materials. Begin."

Saito threw the branch to C-1 which deftly caught the branch in its claws and then began sawing into smaller sections with its buzz saws, then it cut the sections into straight boards and stripped the bark from the outside of them. In a flurry of sawdust it reduced the branch into a pile of neat inch a quarter thick boards. It then began lining the boards together with its pincers while a pair of tiny arms, that unfolded from the main body, pressed nails to the wood in front of its third arm. With a slight thump of air and steam the metal bar shot from the arm and drove the nails into the wood forcing the boards together. As it worked Louise whistled in appreciation.

"It's a very impressive machine." She complimented. "So smooth and precise in its movements, almost elegant I would say."

"It is some of my better work," Saito said all but beaming with pride, "Especially considering the abysmal state of the tools and materials I had to work with."

"I'm especially impressed it has been running so long. Most clockwork dolls wind down after just a few minutes."

"Those would be simple single spring systems and probably not particularly well designed. This clank has a ten spring continuous reversing engine in it reinforced with a steam boiler for on the move rewinding." Saito explained, Louise gave him a look and he toned back the techno-babble as he continued, "Basically it has ten springs inside that move the gears and whatnot. Five of them run down powering most of its machinery while five more are wound up by the energy it doesn't use. If any spring runs out a steam driven piston within it will rewind the spent spring. It can run for about twenty hours on its own or about twelve hours if it's working on a project."

By the time Saito had finished explaining, the clank had finished its work. It turned back to face them and handed Louise a scale model of a square shaped house. Louise was really impressed. The model had holes in it for square window and detailed carving on its roof of shingles and on one of its walls of a door. For a person to have made this, it would've take hours and the clank had done it in minutes.

"So if you built this little guy to help you build other things how come it's also so good a cutting the arms off of people?"

"Well obviously it has to able to defend itself." Saito said as if this was indeed self evident. "Part of its function will be to gather lumber for me which means going out into the woods. And it's dangerous out in the woods. There's bears out in the woods."

"You designed your clank to dismember people in order to protect itself from bears?"

"Technically I allowed C-1 to designate certain moving images as hostile trees so that if they approach or attempt to touch it, the clank will automatically begin harvesting them. Starting by removing their limbs."

"So you designed your clank to dismember anyone who touches it?" Louise asked inching slightly back from the machine.

"Well first of all you are apparently recorded in its memory as an administrator so you never have to worry about it hurting you. In fact this little bugger will follow any order you give it that it understands and will fight to protect you from harm. Second for this thing to recognize that it had been touched you would have to strike it hard enough to send vibrations running through it. Basically the only thing it can feel would be a hammer blow. And if someone is hitting one of my clanks with a hammer than they deserve to get made into a scale model of a house."

"And all of that is built into that logic engine thing you mentioned earlier, that you built even though you don't know how it works."

"Correct." Saito confirmed. "Do you have any other questions?"

"Just one right now." Louise said, "What's a 'spark'?"

Saito gave her a look. They say it is possible to give someone a look that instantly lets them know just how far the looker is away from their home. A look that is somehow made of pure homesickness. In that moment Saito gave Louise a look just like that. And Louise felt awful inside and she had no idea why.

"You've never heard of sparks?" He asked desperately.

"I've heard of small bits of fire that jump off of pieces of metal when the strike each other." Louise explained in a way that was almost but not quite insulting. "I've never heard of a person being called one. Or being a strong spark for that matter."

"How about Mad Boys? Evil Geniuses? Mad Scientists? Mad Alchemists? Thinkomancers?" Louse shook her head as he named each one. "So you people don't have sparks at all? No wonder your knowledge is so backwards. Next you'll be telling me that you people don't even know what science is."

Louise stared blankly at Saito. As her unsaid words sank into him he suddenly cried out and put his head in his hands. "Gott im Himmel that's depressing. I suddenly want to stop talking to you, stick my hand underground and scream myself deaf."

"I think that would be a bad idea." Louise offered trying to comfort him, "I'm guessing that science is what you all used instead of magic in your world?"

"Pretty much." Saito said leaning back in his chair. "Science is the idea that everything that happens was caused by something that happened before it. It asks the question why the world works the way it does and once you answer that question you can make the world behave in the way you want it to.

"For instance; here if you want to fly you cast a levitation spell and off you go. In my world we know that when things heat up their volume increases, lowering their density and causing them to rise above objects with higher density. So if we want to fly we inflate a balloon with air and then heat that air up. The hot air becomes less dense than the cold air around it and is pushed up into the sky. If you have a balloon big enough you can tie yourself to it and float away with it."

That all made sense to Louise. Magic basically did the same thing only instead of messing with causes and everything magic just directly controlled the four core elements. And Saito explanation of hot air also made sense since explained why smoke rose even though it was full of earth and should therefore fall to the ground seeking its natural place. She nodded for him to continue.

"People who investigate the world and how it works are called scientists, and the best scientists are sparks. Sparks have perfect memories, very logical, analytical minds, a natural talent at inferring unseen facts and thus are all really, really good researchers. But the most unique thing about sparks is that the more a spark focuses on a question or problem the more powerful their minds become. It's like a spark's mind gradually build momentum as it works. And when a spark really get going they enter the 'mad place.'

"A spark in full on madness can follow a dozen trains of thought simultaneously, think so quickly it seems like they are making insane leaps of logic. Their bodies move with inhuman precision and efficiency almost warping the laws of known movement and space to get things done far faster than should ever be possible. When a spark enters their madness there is nothing they can't build.

"I have no idea how a logic engine really works but while I was in my madness last night nothing would be simpler for me to build. Also while I was working I apparently realized something about you that was important enough to give you the right to control my machine as well. I can't even begin to understand what I was thinking at the time but the results are plain to see.

"Oh and one more thing. All sparks are insane. And the faster our mind start working the crazier we get." Louise sighed at that last statement. Of course he was insane. The smartest man she would ever meet, a man who's knowledge could change the world, and the very man who was her familiar and he was insane by his own admission.

"So what do you think your insane self saw in me that was worth following?" Louise said finally coming to the point of this conversation.

"Following? Nothing. I told you Heterodynes don't follow people." Saito said, shooting down Louise's first hope. "But I might be able to guess at a few things about you that might be worth working with."

"What does that mean?" Louise asked more than a little surprised.

"All in good time." Saito said dismissively, "But first I was wondering if you might be willing answer a question of mine?"

"Go ahead." She said.

"It might be a bit hard for you to answer." Saito warned.

"You answered my questions, it's only fair that I answer yours."

"Very well. So why do your classmates call you 'The Zero?'" Louise cringed at that question and Saito continued, "Was what you said back at the duel true?"

"Yes it was." Louise finally said after some time. The admission clearly pained her so Saito nodded gravely in sympathy. "My unofficial runic name stands for 'zero accuracy,' none of the spells I have ever tried to cast work how they are supposed to."

"You mean they don't work at all or they do something other than advertised?" Saito asked.

"I mean they all explode." Louise clarified but Saito only seemed slightly more confused."Here watch."

Louise stood up and moved over to a different table. She pulled out her wand and placed a small rock on the center of the table. In the back ground Siesta who had heard of Louise's spell craft quickly backed away and ducked behind a tree. Saito looked on intently at her.

"This is an earth spell that should turn this rock into brass." She explained and then chanted in a strange tongue. "Ausuz Kau Isaz Rhwaz..."

Saito didn't recognize the words though they sounded vaguely Scandinavian to him. Somehow he knew they mean 'Grant me Power to Control the Object,' probably that translation spell working for him again, though he wondered why it didn't change the sound of the words themselves. The whole thing sounded more like a prayer to Saito than a spell. But his musings were cut short when, with a flick of her wand, Louise finished her spell and the rock exploded.

The explosion itself was a lot of smoke, bright light and a loud noise. There was a shockwave strong enough to push Saito back into his chair but too weak to knock him over. Saito guessed it was as powerful as maybe ten pounds of black powder going off. Since it hadn't been contained or directed the blast had quickly dissipated, but it was still rather impressive. When the smoke cleared Louise was still standing unharmed if a bit dirtier.

"You see?" Louise lamented, "No matter what spell I try they all end up as nothing but a puff of useless smoke. It's little wonder everyone thinks-"

"That was Awesome!" Saito exclaimed interrupting Louise. She glared at him for mocking her, but he looked strangely sincere. Then he began bombarding her with questions. "You can cause explosions at will? How do they work? Why weren't you harmed by a blast going off so close? At the very least you should be deaf right now. Does the quality of the explosion change when you try to control different elements? Can you aim the explosions to occur at a distance? Can you make organic material explode like that? Could you make an explosion happen inside something else? What about inside of something you can't see? Do you think that your just using too much power or that your natural elemental affinity simply reacts violently in contact with other magic types?"

"I don't know!" She yelled to quiet Saito down, "The point is the spell doesn't do what it's supposed to."

"So?" Saito dismissed. "If we ignored every unexpected outcome knowledge would never progress at all. What do your professors tell you about it?"

"Mostly they just get frustrated with me till they finally just stop asking for me to try and cast any spells at all." Louise said, in truth she was grateful for that since it meant she had much less of chance to mess up in front of her classmates.

"You mean they've never tried to figure out just how your magic works? Or if there is any way for you to control your explosions?" Louise shook her head and Saito looked at her disbelievingly. "You mean they've had in their midst a mystery that could change the whole world's understanding of magic and they just ignore it? What kind of professors are they anyway?"

"They've tried to help me but nothing works. No matter what I do or what spell I try they all just blow up and fail. And how is the fact that my spells explode supposed to change the world's understanding of magic?"

"Think scientifically. If the circumstances are properly assembled the desired event will occur. Now it seems to me that you need three things for a spell to work. A working wand, to say the right words and to channel the appropriate kind of magic in a sufficient amount."

"How do you know that? Your world doesn't even have magic!"

"Oh please I told you scientists figure out how things work, sparks are the best scientists and I am a very strong spark. Osmond said spells can't be cast without a wand so you need them. When you cast you spoke in that strange language of yours. The fact that that language isn't the common tongue means there is power in the words and even casually saying them could cast a spell. So clearly the words are important. And you said that the spell you tried was an earth spell so presumably it's called that because it uses earth magic so there probably is fire, wind and water magic as well. Have I missed anything?"

"No you haven't, those are the essential ingredients to most spells. Though there are also spells that require specific ingredients or reagents to work. You also need to have access to a major element around you to draw power from. A bit of stone for earth magic, heat or intense light for fire, humidity for water and air for wind at the very least."

"From the fact that Guiche introduced himself as 'the bronze' and could only send golems at me to fight I'll also guess that all mages have a natural affinity for certain elements?" Louise nodded affirmatively. "And I'll guess that most mages can only use certain elements at first and take more intensive training to master others?"

"That's correct. Mages who can control one element are called dot class mages. Line class for two elements. Triangle for three elements, which can either be three different elements or adding a previous element again to strengthen the effect of the spell. Square class can control four elements and are the most powerful mages in the world."

"So for a spell to fail you either said the words wrong, had a bad wand, didn't have access to a necessary reagent, didn't have an example of the appropriate element to work the spell or you channeled the wrong kind of magic. Now if you had a problem with any of those first four you would've been able to easily correct the problem and wouldn't be known as 'The Zero' so you're clearly channeling the wrong kind of magic for that spell."

"But that happens with every type of spell I cast! Earth, water, fire or air it doesn't matter they all just explode!"

"So clearly you have an affinity for some fifth element then." Saito concluded looking rather smug with himself. Louise was struck dumb. It seemed so simple. How had it never occurred to her before? But it was impossible. There were only four types of magic! Unless... She gulped heavily.

"Are you suggesting that I'm a void mage?" Louise would never have even dared to hope for that kind of power. The only previously known void mage had been Founder Brimir who was practically a god.

"I don't know," Saito said with a shrug. "Does void magic usually blow things up?"

"I would think not. Void magic would be a holy power." Louise said the very idea seeming more and more ridiculous to her. "I can't possibly be a void mage. It's a lost element, it's impossible for anyone to use it."

"Then you might have some sixth unknown or new elemental affinity." Saito guessed, then he sipped his tea and continued. "It doesn't really matter since it all means the same thing for you in the end."

"What do you mean?" Louise asked unsure if she would like the answer.

"I mean if even you have a hard time believing that your magic is part of some hitherto unknown element even though you've lived your whole life struggling with it then no one else will either. No matter how hard you work, even if you manage to invent a whole new school of magical though with no help at all, in their eyes you will always be a failure and a screw up. All because your spells aren't proper magic, no matter how powerful they are, no one will ever recognize it. To be seen as a normal you will have to spend years mastering an unknown element and then even longer learning to use it in conjunction with another element. You will have to become a line mage just to be seen as a beginner. And even then you will be the girl who had to spend years learning what others mastered in a few weeks."

"In other words..." Louise concluded forcing herself to say the words she spent every quiet moment with herself dreading. "That this year of ridicule and abuse I've endured is never going to end no matter what I do? That can't be right surely if I could just get my magic to do something useful..."

"Explosions are hugely useful." Saito contended. "Anyone who can't see that is an idiot. Anyone with a single ounce of creativity could think of a dozen ways to attain the same effects of a desired spell only using explosions. In my world the question of 'how do you change rock into brass using nothing but a large blast?' would be relished as a welcome challenge. Here no one would see the point they would just ask 'why not just use a regular alchemy spell?' And that's the biggest problem right there. Your world is stagnant.

"The evidence is everywhere you look. Your nations have reached a level of sophistication that solves most of their pressing problems so they have stopped progressing. In my world an academy is a place where great minds gather to conduct ground breaking experiments and advance all the knowledge in the world. Student are expected to teach themselves the basics and pay to come to universities to play some small part in those greater works. Gleaning knowledge from geniuses around them and perhaps gaining some small incites of their own that one day will form the basis of their own research. But here there is no research, no experimentation nothing new. You haven't come here to discover, but merely to learn. Your professors aren't pressing the bounds of known magic, just passing on what is already known, what is already seen as good enough to the next generation. Here they only work to preserve.

"Who was the last person you know of who came up with a whole new spell? I bet you it was years ago and people consider it a quaint curiosity. No one else wants to learn it. No one is lining up to see it or find out how they discovered it. Because everyone knows that the magic they have is good enough so there's no need to make something new.

"Tradition is what will keep you down. Tradition is a comfort to people and those who have made it a central part of their lives will not allow it to change quickly. Tradition says there are only four elements of magic so if you claim you know a fifth or sixth no one will believe you. Believing you means that their tradition was wrong and if it's wrong about one thing it could be wrong about others. Admitting your right means reevaluating everything they believe and no one wants to do that. So no one will believe you. And you will never be a true mage in their eyes."

"My mother was the last person I know of to invent a new magic." Louise said when Saito finally paused. "You are right that no one is interested in learning her techniques but she is respected by others. In fact she's a hero."

"Exactly." Saito said as if Louise had just made his point for him. "To get respect your mother had to do impossible things to the point that she became a hero for it. That is what you have to do. Graduating from this academy, showing up your rivals, succeeding at a few simple spells, those things won't earn anyone's respect. If you want to be remembered as a great mage you have to do something so great that people have to recognize you and deal with your magic respectfully.

"Personally I wouldn't go into the whole hero business. There's little profit to be made in it, little hope of retiring, horrible health coverage, and terrible hours. Plus if you make one mistake or morally ambiguous decision then your reputation is ruined forever and you'll probably end up getting killed trying to save some snot nosed, brat from something really stupid, that's their own fault in the first place, and they won't even remember you in a year or two. I suggest that we start our own kingdom."

"I am not rebelling against Tristain!" Louise all but shouted while glaring at Saito.

"I didn't say take over a kingdom. Any random twit can overthrow a country, what we need to do is build a completely new one. Nothing could be simpler really. First we build an unbeatable army from various mercenary and bandit groups. Then we join up with a nation involved in a losing war or go raiding in a country you don't like. Basically we just spend a few years proving that our army is unbeatable. Then we pick a largely uninhabited region with plenty of natural resources and good defenses and build a castle there. Our army will have amassed a large group of camp followers like armies naturally do, so then we just hire those camp followers to become farmers, miners, workers, merchants and everything else we need to become self sustaining.

"When word gets out that we're paying high wages for simple work and that our unbeatable army has created a region of peace and stability in these troubled times, we'll begin to attract a steady influx of civilian immigrants. We keep taxes low, crack down hard on local crime and act as a neutral ground between various neighboring kingdoms and we can promote numerous local businesses making us into an economic powerhouse. Eventually it will be much more profitable for the surrounding nations to recognize us as new a kingdom to begin peaceful trade. And just like that we have a new kingdom. Play our cards right and we can pass that kingdom on to our descendents and now we're in the history books. Louise and Saito who brought a whole new nation into the world and changed it forever."

As Saito rambled out his vision, Louise was deep in thought. Not about nation building but how strange it was that Saito just assumed that creating a whole new kingdom was not only possible but rather easy. Saito never ceased to astound her. Just when she thought she had him figured out he went and did or said something even more ludicrous. She almost believed him. She almost believed that this crazy young familiar of hers really could create a whole new country out of nothing. But whether it was possible or not didn't actually matter. The question that mattered was, 'is it worth trying?' Could she really justify breaking off from her homeland to go on a mad quest to disrupt the world's balance of power just for the sake of satisfying her pride? Of being known as a great mage?

Louise was still mauling over that question when Saito finished. He looked at her expectantly. No doubt preparing to rebuff the objections he was sure she would raise to the whole endeavor. She decided to stall and throw him a curve ball or two.

"Why do you care about proving that my magic is worth people's attention?" She asked, "What do you hope to gain out of this nation building?"

"The same thing you do." Saito replied nonplussed. "I will make our new kingdom into a land of industry and progress. Our academies will answer life's mysteries and our factories will flood the world with inexpensive, high quality goods. The rest of the world will adapt and adopt my version of science or it will fall so far behind that our children can subjugate it all at their will. I will end this world stagnation one way or another."

"Why work with me?" Louise asked, "You don't obey me and you don't need a useless mage to help your plans along."

"I didn't need to fight Guiche with my powers and my clank either but I still did." Saito countered. "I don't need to do any of this. I can just leave and spend the rest of my life as a wandering shoe salesmen. But I want to do this with you. You have endure things that would shatter most normal people and you mastered them, made them into a source of strength. You are a natural leader and your girlish charms makes your bravery inspiring and while your followers will naturally want to protect you. That makes you the perfect carrot to compliment my stick when it comes to inspiring our men. Plus you also offer several unique advantages. Helping you master your magic will not only make you into a force to be reckoned with it will also give us an edge over any other mages. Your status as a noble gives this whole operation a sense of legitimacy that the common soldiers will appreciate. Your family connections will make it easier to get out nation recognized. And it means that all our reforms will ultimately be coming from an establish member of the 'old guard'. Allowing us to subvert the norm without really breaking tradition."

"I don't see why we have to go to the extremes of nation building. Surely there is another way?"

"Of course there are other ways. There's no such thing as an either or situation. We could become wandering heroes. Or wandering mercenaries. We could build an invincible army and then conquer the world in the name of your homeland. We could just pick cities to start blowing up at random and become scourges on this world the likes of which will never be seen again. We could become merchants make a fortune and then use it to reinvigorate a failing city and rebuild it in our image. We could start a new religion. We could start a revival for an old religion. We can really do anything so long as it's difficult and gives a chance to succeed so often and so well that no one could ever write off our accomplishments as a lucky fluke. That way they have to admit that there really is something real to your magic and my science.

"But let me ask you this. Everything you have suffered in your whole life is because a systemic flaw in society itself. The world around you is so convinced that your magic can't be real that it would rather treat you like a failure and beat you up everyday rather than admit that its traditions might be wrong. Do you think you are the only one this has happened to? Have there been other zeros in this world suffering just like you have? What if some of them don't have your strength of character? What if this world has driven people to their death rather than give them a chance to succeed on their own terms? Doesn't that thought infuriate you? Doesn't that make you want to make a better world for them? A world that would welcome people like you and help them to succeed in any way they can?"

Louise nodded. She would've killed for a place like that to run to growing up. She was always going on about making the world a better place. Maybe it was time to try some drastic measures. She couldn't justify making a whole new kingdom for herself, but she could justify kicking ass and taking names if it meant making a place for people like her to be safe.

"Alright, alright. We'll create a whole new nation." Louise agreed. She felt like some great tension had broken when she said that. As if the world was a much simpler place now and the work was already half done. Saito relaxed as well, smiling at her as if he had always known she would agree. "But there are a few things to clear up first. If you want to take advantage of my nobility that will mean making me into royalty. And that will mean problems for you, Mr. I Bend Knee to No One Heterodyne."

"I think Queen Louise Franciose Valliere the 0th has a certain respectable ring to it." Saito said, "But yes even then I won't bow to you. I am no one servant. But I will be your partner."

"Royalty doesn't usually do partners." Louise playfully countered.

"Royalty should learn to listen to a good deal when they hear one. And this is the best deal a Heterodyne has ever offered anyone. So listen up. I propose we form an alliance between ourselves and all of our descendents. Your enemy will be my enemy, your goals will be my goals, whenever you are in need I will come and help you in any way I can. And Vice Versa. We work together, we fight together, we live or die together. No orders, only advice. You want to lead? Then start walking, so long as it's towards something I'll come with you to make sure you don't die along the way.

"When we have our kingdom you will have your palace, your courts and your nobles to fawn on you and your princes and princesses. I will have a skull fortress up on a mountain somewhere with eyes that weep lava flows and dramatically time lightning going off every now and then. There will be no law but my own madness with in it, but that madness won't trouble your country side. And if another nation should cross us we will both come out and rain vengeance upon them."

"Sounds reasonable." Louise admitted, it wasn't like she could really force him to give anything up, nonetheless there was one small issue. "But I want to add one thing."

"Oh? What?"

"My friends are your friends and vice versa. We don't go around picking fights with each other's allies or servants."

"Alright, sounds simple enough." Saito granted with a shrug.

"And so you know," Louise continued speaking in a very quickly now. "Despite how it may seem I actually have a whole lot of friends here at this academy and around the world. So before you go about killing anyone, or even attacking them you will simply have to run it by me first to make sure they are not one of my many, many friends."

Saito stared blankly at the pink haired girl as if trying to wrap his head around what she had just said. "Did you just try and run a legal circle around me? I'm not sure whether to be impressed or furious."

"I just want to make sure we're not going to do anything that will overly inconvenience each other. Like getting one of us thrown in jail and awaiting execution."

"Urrrg." Saito groaned. "The lengths I go through to get a partner on my side who might be able to blow up people's heads just by pointing at them. You had better appreciate this. Fine no random killings and whenever possible we will consult with one another about who to off. But know this, I am not going to compromise my ability to protect myself or you, or my ability to respond to changing situations, just to keep the body count low. And there are some people who just need to die. This is not a peaceful path that we walk."

"Peaceful or not, I will not have innocent blood on my hands even by association." Louise said emphatically.

"Very well. Then from this day on, we share enemies, goals and friends. If ever we or any of our descendents are in need the other will come to our aid. Agreed?"

"Agreed." Louise said, she picked up a knife from the table and fiddled with it in her hand. "Shall we swear by blood?"

Saito nodded. They each took a simple knife and made a cut across their palms just deep enough to let the blood flow. Then they clasped their cut hands together so the blood intermingled. Louise winced slightly since it stung. Saito laughed softly at that. Louise rolled her eyes and spoke.

"I swear by the pentagon of elemental magic, by the void and the heavens that I will always stand alongside my familiar and all who come after him. His enemies are my enemies, his friends my treasured allies, his goals are my goals now and forever."

"I swear by science," Saito said after her, "By all I know or will learn, by fate and causality, by heaven or hell that I will never abandon my young mistress and will always come to her aid. Her enemies will die by my hands, her friends I will protect and her goals I will see completed; now and forever."

Around them the sun slowly sank in the west, as they had spent the whole day speaking and debating. The long shadows ran towards them and shifted as the trees that cast them danced in the wind. The world bore witness to their oath and on that quiet spring evening it seemed to shudder. The power of science and the void stood united, the world would soon begin to turn.

_Author's note: Thank you all for enduring that absurdly long dialog chapter with me. This was the hardest chapter I written yet, I just couldnt seem to get much momentum going with it. But now its done. Still not sure if it was to early to have this conversation or if I should've given Saito another day to feel out the world but I think he is more than capable of infering everything he said just through what he's seen. I don't know. What do you all think?_

_Thanks by the way for the reviews, favorites and follows, its always good to come home to an email inbox full of notices from the site. _

_Adnin: stop reading my mind and spoiling the story for the rest of us._

_David: I don't think I'm going to add any new characters to the FoZ just put a new spin on old ones. _

_Sinuhe: That's a brilliant idea and I'm going to steal it thank you. _

_Now about the Louise and Saito. So I've seen in other FoZ fanfics I've read that people tend to gravitate to two ends with these two. Either they remove Saito from the story so Louise can shine on her own. Or the make Saito into a total badass that dominates the action. Both of these I feel are ways to avoid Louise's biggest character flaw: Her abusive nature towards Saito. Its funny in the anime, but really twisted if you think about it two much. Obviously Saito Heterodyne isn't going to take that kind of crap and Louise knows it now. But I don't want Saito to overshadow Louise either. What I hope to do is gradually build a story where the two feed into each other. This isn't going to be a Science vs Magic story, though a lot of that will happen and I have two words for you people: Battle Clanks, this is a story of what happens when two forms of knowledge cooporate to change the world. _

_Also I am now taking all bets on what the staff of destruction will be. Till next time thanks for reading. _


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